You Gotta Be Kidding
by Lampito
Summary: She was a very dangerous witch, Sam said. With a very dangerous spell book, Sam said. Don't touch it, Sam said. But Dean's thinking with his Downstairs Brain again. **UPDATE** 18 OCT 11 - link to some amazing fanart.  The Denizens are teh clever.
1. Chapter 1

This is actually a bunny that has been lurking under my laptop for a long time, but it's always been too shy to come out and tell me the details of what was on its mind. Then, recently, knivespast sent another one very similar, and together, they were a bit more courageous, and hopped out and whispered the beginnings of what might turn out to be a plot. So, maybe if I can write a first chapter, that will give them a little bit of confidence, and more inspiration will follow.

**DISCLAIMER:** I don't own 'em, I just cover them in cappuchino froth and chocolate sprinkles for others to lick off.

**TITLE:** You Gotta Be Kidding

**RATING:** T. Until such time as Dean joins a monastery, and frankly, I can't see him handling the whole vows of silence and chastity very well.

**SUMMARY:** She was a very dangerous witch, Sam said. Her grimoire is a very dangerous book, Sam said. Don't touch it, Sam said. Trouble is, Dean's been thinking with his Downstairs Brain again. Now Bobby is using the word 'idjit' with extreme prejudice.

**BLAME:** Standard disclaimer applies: this fanfic, along with all the bumf that dribbles out of what passes for my mind onto this site, is ENTIRELY THE FAULT of the Denizens, Visitors, Lurkers, and Casual Droppers-In of the Jimiverse, ESPECIALLY knivespast, who sent the extra plot bunny for moral support.

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><p><strong>Chapter 1<strong>

"They all hate me," moaned Dean, holding the ice pack to the side of his head. "God, the Fates, Karma, the Universe, Lady Luck, Random Chance, every single one of them. They all hate me."

"Don't be so melodramatic, Dean," Sam rolled his eyes.

"It's true, Sam!" Dean insisted, raising his voice, then wincing. "It's totally true! They hate me. They mock me. They take every opportunity to have a laugh at me expense. Why? Why? Why do they toy with the Living Sex God?"

"It serves you right, for letting Little Dean use all the oxygenated blood so often, instead of letting your upstairs brain drive," Sam told him.

Dean turned a reproachful glare on his brother. "I had hoped I might at least get some sympathy, bro," he said with a small grumpy pout, "After I trawled myself as bait for a bloodthirsty, relentless monster that's killed at least a dozen guys we know of, and probably hundreds before them, risking my wellbeing for the good of the Hunt, putting myself on the line to save more guys, not to mention my baby bro, whose safety is my first and last concern at all times..."

"You got caught up in having sex with a hot woman, despite the fact you knew she was a seriously old, seriously powerful, seriously dangerous, seriously evil, seriously in-need-of-ganking witch," Sam pointed out. "Just consider yourself lucky. You ended up with some bruises and a concussion. The other guys she took home, they ended up with the remaining years of their lives sucked out..."

"Ohhh, yeah, the sucking was definitely powerful," mused Dean, a vague cross-eyed smile on his face.

"... Until they died as shrivelled, elderly, dessicated husks, so she could keep herself eternally young and beautiful," finished Sam, with a generous dose of Bitchface #6™ (I SO Do NOT Want To Hear The Gory Details Of One Of Your Sexual Conquests, Jerk). "You knew she was screwing men to death for her own amusement and personal gain, Dean. Maybe they died happy, but the point is, they died."

"Dat ass, Sammy, dat ass," sighed Dean, adjusting his ice pack, "Dat ass, dat rack, dem legs, dat whole totally hot package. Why couldn't she have the decency to look old and evil? Old, evil, dangerous witches should look like old, evil dangerous witches! They should be bent, and wrinkled, and grey, and warty, and smell bad, and dress like a cross between a scarecrow and a Goodwill collection bin!" He sighed. "This is how I know that God, and Fate, and all those other nebulous assholes hate me – evil witches should _not_ be allowed to walk around with the legs of Maria Sharapova, the ass of Pippa Middleton, the rack of Raquel Welch, a face that's a combination of Audrey Hepburn and Michelle Pfeiffer, the lips of Angelina Jolie, and the suck power of a Hoover..."

"The whole point, here, Dean," Sam interrupted before his big brother could detail any more of the witch's more desirable attributes, "Was that she was using seriously evil juju to maintain that. She was at least 400 years old! And you knew it! But you just couldn't help yourself, could you? Nooooo, you just had to get drawn into the lair of the evil life-sucking witch."

"It was all part of the plan, Sam," protested Dean. "Including the sucking. Dat sucking…"

"The plan was to kill her, Dean! Kill her, not drill her! Blow her brains out, not screw her brains out!"

"She probably used some evil spell, combined with her feminie wiles, to take advantage of the Living Sex God," Dean told his brother. "I mean, look at this book." He poked at the witch's grimoire, which Sam had nabbed before they'd torched the house. "It even looks evil. What's the cover made of?"

"Human skin, I think," theorised Sam, suppressing a small shudder. The grimoire gave him the creeps; it radiated a tangible menace all of its own, even though its owner was now dead. "I'm telling you, bro, it's got a really, really bad vibe to it DON'T TOUCH THAT!"

"What?" asked Dean, inspecting one of the bookmarks wedged between the yellowed pages. It was made of leather, and intricately carved with the realistically detailed form of a voluptuous naked woman. "I just want to check out the bookmarks. Look like some really fine craftsmanship there..."

"We're not touching a damned thing, Dean," Sam told him assertively, "Until Bobby can get a look at this thing. I'm not kidding, it's giving me the creeps. The spell book belonging to a witch that powerful, it's a dangerous artefact. It has to be dealt with carefully. Like it's an unexploded bomb, or something. I really don't want to mess with it, until Bobby checks it out, and comes up with a plan to deal with it without anything blowing up in our faces. So, leave the erotic bookmarks alone, and go find some porn to jerk off to."

"Not really an option, since you won't let me use your laptop," grumped Dean.

"Use the other one," Sam told him shortly.

"It's not as good! It takes so long to load! It crashes too often!" complained Dean.

"That's because you jam it up with questionable porn from questionable sites of questionable content with questionable security," Sam said. "I'm sick of cleaning it up every time you manage to download a whole bunch of viruses with your latest viewings from Large-Breasted Women Rubbing Themselves With Honey In Front Of Midgets, or Near-Naked Ladies Stuffing Jelly Down Each Other's Bikinis, or Blonde Bumbling Bewildered Biker Biochemist Bimbos Being Badass, or What's Your Perversion? Depravity Of The Week..."

"I had no idea you were keeping tabs on my favourites list," leered Dean, the leer turning into a wince as his head throbbed. "Ow. I'd only make the headache worse looking at a screen. Can't I have a bookmark? One little smutty bookmark?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"I promise, all I want to do is look at it, you know, not get it, er, soiled, or anything..."

"Dean!"

"What if I promise to put it in a ziplock bag?"

"DEAN!"

"What if I promise not to use any lotion, just in case?"

"_DEAN! SHUT! UP!"_ Sam threw his brother Bitchface #2™ (Dean Is A Simple Animal Governed By The Three Fs: Feeding, Fighting, and… The Other One). "Do NOT touch the witch's book! Okay? Just don't. Leave it for Bobby. I mean it." He started to get ready for bed. "Just go to bed, Dean, and we'll head for Bobby's tomorrow."

"Yes, ma'am, Mother Superior Sammy, ma'am," snarked Dean, nonetheless feeling that bed was what he needed. "See? God, the Fates, Karma, the Universe, Lady Luck, Random Chance, AND my baby brother, His Samness The High Priest Of Killjoy, they all hate me." He sighed as he toed his boots off. "The life of a Living Sex God is paved with difficulties. It's lonely at the top."

When he was under the covers, Jimi the half-Hellhound Rottweiler jumped up onto Dean's bed, as he usually did any time his Alpha was injured. "At least my dog loves me," he grinned, stroking the big square earnest head that snuggled against him.

"G'night, guys," said Sam, turning off his bedside lamp. "Oh, and a warning, Dean: if you start to have Happy-Time dreams and start feeling up the dog, Dean, I reserve the right to throw a bucket of water over you."

"Bitch."

"Jerk."

"Rowf."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Holy shit and Satan's toilet tissue, Sam," breathed Bobby, as he gingerly examined the intricate and faded inscribings on the cover of the large grimoire when they'd handed it over the next day, "This is some seriously nasty mojo you found here."

"She was a really powerful practitioner," Sam told him, relating the details of their last job (which Dean had taken to calling The Case Of The Smiling Stiffs). "I wanted to bring this straight to you, figure out what to do with it. It just gave me a really, really creepy feeling."

Bobby snorted with laughter. "I don't know whether to pat you on the head for being sensible, or kick you in the ass for bringing this within shouting distance of my house," he grinned ruefully, eyeing the old book warily. "It's too dangerous to keep. We'll have to... defuse it. Kill it. It'll take some time to set up some protection wards before it's safe to even try to open it. And your idiot brother just waltzed into her home to confront her?"

"Actually, he did the horizontal hula into her bedroom to confront her," huffed Sam.

Bobby looked appalled. "That boy is an idjit," he declared. "He's lucky he didn't get his head blown clean off. Or his life sucked clean out of him."

"You know what he's like," shrugged Sam. "Caution is something that happens to other people."

"How is he, anyway?" asked Bobby gruffly.

"He'll be fine in a day or so," Sam reassured him, "The bookcase hit him in the head, so it's not like it damaged anything vital. He just needs to sleep it off for a while."

"Idjit," repeated Bobby, shaking his head. "I'm gonna need some coffee before I tackle this. And some help with the inscriptions for the protection runes. I may have to make a couple of calls, talk to some ladies I know who may be able to offer some insights into this thing." He glared at the book. "God's tits, I'd swear the damned thing is glaring right back at me. I've got this urge to lock it in the panic room."

Bobby and Sam had retired to Bobby's study to consult his references when Dean came wandering down the stairs in response to the smell of coffee. He'd woken up with his Upstairs Brain feeling better, and his Downstairs Brain feeling awesome. One of the perks of being the Living Sex God, he grinned to himself. In fact, he was thinking about getting out the second laptop, and trying to find a new and interesting site. Ever since Sam's rant a couple of days earlier, he'd found himself wondering if there was actually a site with Large-Breasted Women Rubbing Themselves With Honey (midgets would be a bonus). He poured himself a mug of the nectar of the gods, then wandered into the living room.

Sam's laptop sat on the table, but the screen was locked. He tried some possible passwords – Deansajerk, Shampoorules, Ilovesalad, Paisleyissexy – but none worked. Damn you, Sam, he thought, just because I may have inadvertently downloaded the occasional tiny little bit of spam while looking at hot women, that's no reason to lock me out of your computer. It really wasn't fair; just because his little brother's dick had probably shrivelled up from lack of use by now, why would he want to make his big brother suffer?

With a disappointed sigh, he noticed the witch's book sitting on the table, the intricate fringed bookmarks still wedged between the pages.

He frowned thoughtfully. They really were interesting bookmarks. The artistic rendering of well-proportioned young ladies, in a state of undress, was striking, realistic, and very very interesting. It was craftsmanship. The one nearest the top depicted a frolicking female form, wearing a come-hither smile and a little bit of ivy in her hair – her generously endowed chest just peeked out from between the pages. Dean's Upstairs Brain noticed a resemblance, and wondered if they were meant to be self-portraits of the witch. Dean's Downstairs Brain wondered if the artist's eye for detail extended all the way down the figure...

He was pretty confident he could pull a bookmark out of a book without accidentally reading anything, let alone reading anything aloud – Sam was such a drama queen. The way he'd talked about the book, it was as though he thought it could actually bite him, or something.

So, he took a careful hold of the inscribed strip of leather, and pulled...

He'd swear later that as he did so, the damned thing had _growled_ at him.

He didn't see the look of complete horror on Bobby's face as the old Hunter and his brother made their way back from the study, armed with notes and books. He didn't see the flash of bright blue light as the pages sprang open as if of their own accord, because as he pulled out the bookmark, Bobby charged across the room, throwing Dean to the ground. All Dean really saw was the carpet coming up to meet him, really, really fast...

"Oof!" he grunted, all the air coming out of him as he hit the floor full length. "Ow!" he complained, sitting up and rubbing at his still-sore head, "Ow, I really didn't need that. A little bit old to decide to start training for a new career in football, aren't you, Bobby?" He sat up, and looked around, but he didn't see Bobby. All he saw was Sam, staring at him in bewilderment. He grinned, and held up his quarry. "Got my bookmark," he smirked, "And look, nothing happened to me!"

"Not to you, no," Sam told him. Dean realised that Sam wasn't actually looking at him, but past him. He turned around.

In the middle of the living room stood a kid, with a heap of oddly trouser-like fabric at his feet, wearing a plaid shirt that came down to his knees, and a trucker's cap that came down over his ears. He pushed the cap back out of his eyes, and glared suspiciously at the Winchesters.

"Who the hell are you idjits?" demanded the boy.

"Oh, holy shit," groaned Dean.

"And Satan's toilet tissue," added Sam, dropping his face into his hands.

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><p>Reviews give the shy plot bunnies confidence to dictate further chapters...<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

"Oh. My. God." Sam's expression was a combination of world weariness, resignation, and fratricidal intent. "Dean, what the hell did you do?"

"Nothing! I just grabbed a bookmark, and pulled it out, and then… that."

"This is not good, Dean," Sam continued, "This is really, really not good."

"What the hell do we do with… him?" asked Dean.

"I guess we gotta look after him, until I can figure out how to undo whatever it is that you set off," snarked Sam, adding Bitchface #10™ (Tonight, You Die In Your Sleep).

"I don't believe that's Bobby," stuttered Dean, "I mean he's a… a… he's a…"

"A kid?" supplied Sam.

"A ginger!" Dean burst out. "A ginger kid! A genetic freak, suffering from gingeritis! He can't be a ginger, Sam! Say it aint so!"

"Well, I'd have said more auburn than actually red-headed…" Sam offered cautiously.

The boy standing in front of them gave Dean a calculating smirk. "At least l don't look like a girl, like you."

"What? Hey!" Dean sputtered, "I'm the manly man here! Sam's the one with the girly hair, and the girly shirts, and the girly movies, and the girly music, and the girly coffee…"

"Yeah? Last time I saw lips and eyelashes like that was on a Cindy doll," remarked the child.

"Jesus," muttered Dean, studying the boy now standing in front of them, "He can't be more than, what, six years old?"

"I'm seven!" the boy corrected him angrily. "Ya idjit!" He glared right back. "Why don't you take a picture, it'll last longer," the kid informed him, stepping out of the puddled clothing.

"Now, er, Bobby, there's no need to go talking to your, um, Uncle Dean like that," said Sam evenly.

"Uncle Dean?" the child peered suspiciously at him, then back at Dean.

"Yeah, your Uncle Dean." Sam repeated, semaphoring furiously at Dean with his eyebrows, "I know he can be annoying, and rude, but it's because he's so surprised to see you. You've… grown so much since we saw you last. Hasn't he, Dean?"

"What? Uh, yeah, yeah, that's right," nodded Dean, "The last time your… Uncle Sammy and I saw you, you were… very different."

"That might be why you don't really, you know, remember us. Very much," Sam finished.

Bobby stared up at Sam, and his face broke into a grin. "Uncle Sammy!" he yelled, throwing himself at his 'uncle' and grabbing him around the legs. "I remember you! I remember you being tall," he piped happily. "And I remember Uncle Dean being an idjit."

"That's… great, Bobby," grated Dean.

"So, Bobby," Sam went on, "You're going to stay here with us for a little while, won't that be fun?"

Bobby pulled away from him, and that suspicious squint returned. "Do I have to go to school?" he demanded.

"Well, er, not right away…" Sam improvised.

"Yaaaaaaaaaay!" yelled Bobby, running a celebratory lap of the living room. He jumped onto the sofa and began bouncing up and down. "No school! No school! No school!" he sang, the long shirt flapping up and down.

"Oh. Er. I guess we should, um, find you some stuff to wear," commented Dean. "I think there might be some of our stuff from when we were kids packed away, Sam."

"Maybe you could take Bobby upstairs and look for those, then, while I, um, sort out the books, down here," suggested Sam.

"What?" yelped Dean. "Why me?"

"Because you have experience!" Sam hissed. "Now just find him something to wear!"

"Who put you in charge?" muttered Dean, turning back to Bobby. "Okay, tiger," he said to the child, "Let's go get you dressed."

Bobby stopped jumping, and looked at the plaid shirt he was swimming in, the ends of the sleeves dangling several inches over his hands. "This is okay," he announced, resuming jumping.

"It's not really, dude," Dean begged to differ, "Because you're flashing me every time you jump, and that's not cool…"

"I have a dick!" giggled Bobby, lifting the front of the shirt and waggling himself at Dean.

"Yeah, that's great, I understand, I do, but it would be better if you get dressed…"

"I HAVE A DICK!" Bobby shouted. As Dean moved to take hold of his arm, the boy dodged, laughed, and shot out of the room.

"Hey! Come back here!" yelled Dean, setting off in hot pursuit.

Sam sighed, and began gathering up the various books he'd need to try to undo whatever had happened to Bobby.

Dean might've had longer legs, but apparently Bobby was faster through the corners. Sam heard the pursuit as it did laps of the house. The volume ebbed and flowed as the chase continued. He detected occasional bursts of the Doppler effect.

"Come here! Bobby! BOBBYYYYYYYYYYY! Right now!"

"Yaaaa AAAAAAAAAAAAA aaaaay!"

"Bobby, you come back here, right now!"

"I have a dick! I have a diiiiiii IIIIIIIIIIIII iiiiiiiiiiiick!"

"Robert Steven Singer, you get your sorry ass back here RIGHT NOW!"

Sam rolled his eyes. He wasn't sure which one he was going to end up taking to task over their language.

…**..oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo...**

Dean eventually reappeared with Bobby in tow, dressed in clothes that had once been theirs. The child insisted on wearing his trucker's cap, so Dean did up the headband as tight as it would go. It was still too big.

"Uncle Dean says cusswords!" he announced sunnily.

"Yes, he does," agreed Sam, glaring at Dean. "And so do you, young man."

"So, what's happening down here, Uncle Sammy?" asked Dean, as Bobby broke away and began jumping on the sofa again.

"I'll have to set up some wards before I can read the book in detail without risking something else going wrong," Sam scowled at his brother, "But I think it might be to do with the sort of magic the witch was using. She was messing with years of guys' lives. Taking them away, and making herself young again with them. It's possible that she left some sort of, well, booby trap, to go off at anybody who tried to interfere with her book."

"So, you think Bobby got hit by and occult IED?" Dean checked. "Bobby, keep the noise down, can you?"

"The guys she was targeting, they were mostly in their 30s, occasionally in their 40s. Someone that age would've, well, probably de-aged right out of existence. I think Bobby suspected that's what it was – that's why he was so desperate to stop it hitting you. It didn't kill him, it just… regressed him."

"Can you undo this?" Dean gestured at Bobby, who had moved on to running around the room again, making aeroplane noises. "Bobby, knock it off!"

"I don't know," Sam confided, "First, I gotta read the spell, and I can't do that until I can defuse it. I was talking to Bobby about that before you and your hormones set it off…"

"Nnnnnyyyyyrrrrrrrrow!" A twin turbo-prop child made another circuit of the living room.

"Bobby, put a cork in it!" yelled Dean.

Bobby paused briefly, then took off again, adding in some machine gun noises for good effect.

"Hey, Bobby," said Sam brightly, "I've got some work to do in here, and I'll need quiet, so I can do a lot of reading. Why don't you go outside with Uncle Dean, and find a good game to play?"

"Yeah, why don't you HUH?" Dean did a double-take.

"I'm sure that Uncle Dean would love to play with you, seeing as he was the one who arranged for you to visit with us," smiled Sam beatifically.

The Flight Of The Winged Bobby paused mid-zoom. "Ack-ack-ack-ack-a… yeah?" he said, a sunny smile breaking across his face.

"Oh, absolutely," nodded Sam, "He knows lots of games. Don't you, Dean?"

"Oh, yeah, totally," Dean grated out through gritted teeth, "My favourite one being Let's Set Fire To Little Brothers…"

"Yaaaaaaaaay!" yelled Bobby again, grabbing Dean's arm and dragging him towards the door. "Let's set something on fire!"

"You two have fun!" Sam grinned.

"I will toast your ass for this," scowled Dean.

"Hee hee, Uncle Dean did a cussword!" tittered Bobby.

"Yes, he did," intoned Sam seriously, "Should I spank him for it?"

"Ma puts soap in my mouth, if I do cusswords," explained Bobby, "And Father Flaherty says it makes Jesus cry."

"Does that stop you cussing?" asked Sam.

"Hell, no!" grinned Bobby. He looked Dean up and down. "I can help you hold him down to spank him, if you like."

"Bitch," Dean hissed at Sam. Bobby tittered again with hilarity, resuming dragging Uncle Dean to the door.

"Look, I need some time to do research, here!" Sam pointed out. "Just keep him occupied! Find a safe game you can play."

"You have no idea how difficult it is to entertain a seven-year-old," rumbled Dean accusingly.

"Dean, you have a salvage yard, full of junk!" Sam declared, "There are heaps of constructive, educational things you could do. You could make a teepee, you could build a soap box cart, you could make some fishing poles and head for the stream, you could build a bird house, you could play Hide & Seek, you could make a kite, or a glider, you could paint a mural on one of the sheds…"

Bobby eyed Sam dubiously. "Is he for real?" he asked.

"Don't you mind Uncle Sammy," Dean reassured him, "He's from another planet. No, really," Dean went on, as he led Bobby out into the yard, "When he was only a baby, his home planet, Planet Geek, became unstable, and it exploded, and his parents put him into a small escape pod shaped like a brain, and sent him to Earth, to be raised amongst the humans…"

There was a brief burst of barking as Bobby discovered the dogs, then Sam made some more coffee, and headed back into the study. He made a mental note to have a look for some suitable up to date sites on parenting - Bobby could possibly be a child for some time, and he wanted to inform himself about how to look after him. Dean would probably be content for Bobby to live on bacon, Doritos and pie, and let him run riot without any sort of guidance or discipline, but Sam thought they owed it to Bobby to do better than that. Wasn't there some guy called Dr Spock who'd written a famous book on raising kids?...

It took him a while to finalise the protective wards and sigils he'd need to read the dangerous book. He was just putting the final touches onto the last one, when his cell rang. It was Dean.

"Sam!" demanded his brother, "Sam, get your sorry ass out here right now!"

"What? Dean! What's happened?" asked Sam anxiously.

"You know how you told me to go out and build a teepee with Bobby?" Dean reminded him.

"Yeah…"

"Well, we built a teepee. Then Bobby wanted to play Cowboys and Indians, so we're playing Cowboys and Indians."

"I'm not sure that's an appropriate game at all, Dean," frowned Sam, "It's anachronistic, and at its worst, a form of racism. It teaches and reinforces over-simplified, negative stereotypes about First Nation peoples, and suggests that conflict and violence are ways to resolve disagreements, and solve problems, it panders to outdated, debunked and offensive cultural assumptions about the supposed 'superiority' and 'worth' of Caucasian races…"

"I don't give a rat's ass about how politically incorrect it is, Sam!" snarled Dean, as a flurry of war-whooping and barking started in the background, "Just get out here! All the dogs have joined his tribe, and the little bastard's tied me to a tree!"

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><p>Reviews are the Winchesters Tied To Trees in the Garden Of Life!<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

Thank you, dear Denizens, Visitors, Lurkers and Casual Droppers-In, your encouraging words are making the little plot bunny bolder. I shall try to find time to give him a hearing, and aim for an update every couple of days or so.

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><p><strong>Chapter 3<strong>

"It serves you right," humphed Sam as Dean gave him a sheepish little wave with the hand he'd managed to extricate from the tangle of rope. "Cowboys and Indians is not a suitable game for children to play in this day and age. What you were doing letting a seven-year-old get the drop on you, I'll never know."

"He's a bit more… rambunctious than you were," muttered Dean, wiggling out of the rest of the rope, "I wasn't expecting it from a seven-year-old. You couldn't tie a decent knot at that age."

"Hey, don't let him go!" demanded Bobby, "I haven't decided yet whether I'm going to accept him into my tribe, or feed him to the wolves." He indicated Rumsfeld, Janis and Jimi, who sat behind him, grinning doggily, feathers tucked into their collars.

"He'd give them indigestion, and wolves are a protected species," Sam told the boy, as Dean stood up. "Look, do something... constructive. Something that'll be fun, and educational," he instructed his brother. "Something that doesn't require me having to come and rescue you. Like building a bird feeder."

"Yeah, yeah, okay, maybe we could build a bird feeder," muttered Dean.

"Bird feeders are lame," declared Bobby.

"Well, we'll build one that isn't," Dean promised him, the light of inspiration suddenly shining in his eyes, "We'll build one that's totally cool!"

"That's the spirit," smiled Sam, "You two have fun." He went back inside, and returned to his research.

After that there was a stretch of relative quiet, broken only by the odd rasp of a saw, thump of a hammer, whuff of a dog, or…

_whoomph_

Sam sat up. He shook his head. That was ridiculous, for a moment he thought he'd heard something… he returned to his reading.

_WHOOMPH_

Sam's head snapped up. Maybe he was imagining things, he certainly felt like he was going around in circles with the damned

_**WHOOMPH**_

Sam picked himself up from the floor after he'd been startled enough to jump off his chair, narrowed his eyes, and made his way outside.

Dean and Bobby had built a simple bird feeder platform, and set it up in a clear area of the yard. Wisps of blue smoke drifted past.

"What the hell was that?" demanded Sam. "Can I smell... Dean, can I smell gunpowder?"

"It works, Uncle Sammy!" chirped Bobby, grinning from ear to ear, "It works!"

Sam gaped at him, nonplussed. Dean grinned.

"Show Uncle Sammy how our, er, bird feeder works," he told Bobby, handing him a bundle of shop rags with a few feathers sticking out of one end.

"What's that supposed to be?" asked Sam.

"That, Sam, is our test pigeon," Dean told him. "Now, watch, and be amazed at our bird feeder in action."

With a look of intense concentration on his face, Bobby hefted the handful of rag carefully, then tossed it at the bird feeder. It landed on the small platform, and

_**WHOOMPH**_

A small explosion detonated. Sam let out a small yell of surprise as the bundle of rags was blown apart. A single ragged feather drifted gently back to Earth.

"Ta-dah!" announced Dean, "The Winchester-Singer Anti-Pigeon Semi-Automatic Bird Feeder is operational!"

"Yaaaaaaaay!" cheered Bobby.

"Bobby designed the platform, mostly," Dean pointed out. Bobby beamed proudly.

"Dean!" yelped Sam, "You're supposed to make something where the birds can get something to eat, not where they get blown up!"

Dean waved a hand dismissively. "The birds around here are mostly pigeons," he said, "And they're a damned nuisance. They nest in the car bodies, and the shed roofs. They're rats with wings. They spread disease, you know. AND they crap everywhere. They crap on my car, Sam! This is just pest control. Semi-automatic pest control. Now, all we have to do is wait for a real pigeon to come and investigate, and…"

"No, no, no!" insisted Sam. "What sort of an example do you think you're setting for a kid, here, Dean?"

Dean looked thoughtful. "Well, he's learning about feral animal control, and systematic problem solving, since we had to do a series of calibration runs to get the amount of powder per pigeon just right…"

"Dean!" snapped Sam. "Look, no more exploding pigeons, okay? It's not… healthy!"

Dean suddenly looked worried. "You think it might spread their diseases if we blow 'em up?" he asked anxiously. He glanced down at Bobby. "Maybe we should get you a face mask, kiddo…"

"NO!" Sam looked like he might explode. "Do! Not! Detonate! Any! Pigeons!" He pinched the bridge of his nose, and took a deep breath. "Bobby," he began in a more normal voice, "I would like you to understand that, it's really great for you to have a try at designing and building things – you've done a fine job there – but you can't go blowing up birds."

"Uncle Dean says they're rats with wings, and they really annoy him." Bobby contributed.

"Well, they may be, but that doesn't mean you can blow them up, okay?" He glared at Dean. "If we all went around blowing up things that annoy us, I'd have blown up your Uncle Dean years ago…"

"Hey!" protested Dean.

"…And I bet you've annoyed somebody before now. Has anybody ever told you they found you annoying?"

Bobby nodded. Sam knew anybody with brothers or sisters would definitely have been called annoying at some stage.

"Well, just think – would you like it if somebody tried to blow you up, just because they thought you were annoying? Would you think that was fair?"

Bobby considered this, then shook his head.

"Uncle Dean, maybe we shouldn't blow up any pigeons after all," he announced seriously.

Sam smiled. "Thank you, Bobby," he gave Dean a slightly smug grin. "You see, if you just explain to children why it's not right to…"

"Because blowing up pigeons would be fun, but there won't be any meat left on 'em if we blow 'em up," Bobby went on, "I think it would better if we just shot 'em. That's what we usually do. Ma gives us a penny for each one we get with a head shot. It's fun too! Come on, I'll show you!" Bobby smiled, and grabbed Dean's hand, dragging him back towards the house, presumably to hunt for the gun cabinet. Dean gave Sam a happy grin, and another little wave, and let himself be towed away.

Sam stood and allowed himself to fume for a moment. The dogs were all looking at him, still wearing their doggy grins.

"I don't know what you lot are smiling about," he growled.

Jimi cocked his head, whuffed, and led his mother and sister after Bobby and Dean at a trot, presumably to see what new fun and games would ensue. Sam sighed.

"Et tu, Jimi," he said resignedly to himself, trudging back towards the house.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The glowering chilly silence sweeping down from the heights of Mount Sam that evening presaged A Talk later, mused Dean as he waggled the pan. A Talk, which really wasn't a 'talk' as such, since he would not be expected to contribute much. He was pretty sure that this evening's lecture would cover such topics as Suitably Culturally Sensitive Games For Young Children, The Hazards Of Allowing Children To Play With Combustible Substances, Appropriate Nutrition For Grade School Aged Children, and Moral Implications Of Exposing Children To Firearms.

"Dinner's up!" he yelled. Bobby had busied himself with feeding the dogs, insisting it was his job ("Pa says we have to feed the dogs before we get fed, because they do more work than we do"), and came scuttling into the kitchen. "Did you wash your hands?" he asked. Bobby nodded eagerly.

"He got his hands wet, and wiped them on the towel," glowered Sam, dropping into a chair. "What's for dinner?"

"Hamburgers!" Dean grinned as Sam rolled his eyes, and huffed.

"You look like a cat's ass when you do that," commented Bobby, biting enthusiastically into his burger.

"Bobby!" snapped Dean, "Don't talk to your Uncle Sammy like that!" Sam threw a grateful look at Dean, then his older brother went on, "The correct description for that expression is 'bitchface'."

"Hee hee, bitchface, hee hee," giggled Bobby. "Uncle Sammy, you're making a bitchface."

"Bobby, that's a rude and mean thing to say," Sam told him with a glare at Dean, "And don't talk with your mouth full."

Dinner table conversation consisted mainly of Bobby chattering about the day's activities, including a riveting account of tying Dean to the tree, "Although I did offer to let him go if he'd be my squaw," a lurid description of the death throes of a pigeon that had been head shot then tried to fly away without a head, "And that's how I got blood on my shirt, from the zombie pigeon", and some observations about the nature of the lettuce in his burger, "Which is green, and we eat it, like broccoli, and we eat that too, even if it tastes gross, and beans, which are okay, and peas, which are okay too, and apples can be green, and some snakes are green, and some people eat snakes, they taste okay, and boogers are green but if you try to eat those Ma says she'll paddle your tush until you can't sit down…"

Sam blanched, and dropped his burger.

"You can't eat everything that's green," Dean pointed out equably. "Like soap. And shampoo. And Play-Doh. Boogers are in that group. Green, but gross." Bobby considered that, and nodded sagely.

"So, how's the research going?" asked Dean after dinner, when Bobby had retired to the living room to watch TV.

"Slowly," Sam admitted. "It's like walking through a written minefield – I have to keep checking that I'm not going to set off any other booby traps. If I end up seven years old, you will have to try to figure this out." _Which would mean I would stay seven forever_, was the unspoken rider clause.

"Well, keep at it," Dean told him, taking the plates to the sink. Sam elbowed him aside.

"Uh-uh, I'll wash the dishes. You go give Bobby a bath."

"What? I've been keeping him amused all day!" protested Dean. "Why me?"

"Because you got him dirty," said Sam with finality.

"Fine," growled Dean, "No big deal. I had to give your uncooperative ass a bath, he couldn't possibly be any worse than you."

Bobby was not completely convinced that bathing was necessarily… necessary.

"I had a bath on Saturday!" he protested.

"And now it's Tuesday," Dean told him, "And you need another one."

"I'm not dirty!" Bobby insisted.

"Yes, you are," Dean countered, "And you stink, dude – and ladies don't like guys who stink."

"I don't care, girls are stupid," Bobby said decisively, "They're the ones who smell funny."

"Bobby, you have to have a bath," Dean reiterated.

"Why?" Bobby demanded, crossing his arms and pouting.

"Because I say so, and I'm bigger than you," Dean answered, suspecting that Sam would not approve of this approach, no doubt on the grounds that it would frighten the kid, leave him feeling threatened and powerless and humiliated, and damage his innocent trust in the benevolent authority of adult caregiver figures…

Innocent, trusting little Bobby stared right back as his adult caregiver. "Bite me," he snarled.

"Careful what you wish for, kiddo," smirked Dean, as he grabbed Bobby by the scruff of the shirt.

"Dean, what the hell is going on?" asked Sam, bewildered, as Dean headed up the stairs with a yelling, wiggling Bobby under one arm.

"Just off to damage his innocent trust in the belevolent authority of adult caregiver figures," Dean told him serenely, raising his voice to be heard over the ruckus Bobby was raising.

If the noises that filtered back down to the kitchen were anything to go by, it was an exercise akin in brutality to the D-Day Landing.

"I don't wannaaaaaaaa!" _bang_

"Bobby, get in the tub." _splash splash_

"Noooooooooooooooo!" _splish whomp_

"Right now, mister." _thump_

"I don't need a baaaaaaath!" _splash sploosh_

"Bobby, I'm going to count to three, and if you're not in the damn bath by then…"

"If I'm goin' in there, I'm takin' you with me!"

_slish slosh thump CRASH __**SLOOSH**_

"Aaaaaaaargh you little sonofabitch!"

After that, it was quiet. Too quiet.

Twenty minutes later, Dean and Bobby came back downstairs. Bobby was scrubbed clean and pink, and was wearing a set of old Spiderman pyjamas that looked vaguely familiar, and a scowl like a thundercloud. Dean was soaking wet, and wearing a brittle smile and the air of a man who would really feel better if he could just be allowed to strangle something.

"Er, is everything all right?" asked Sam carefully.

"Everything is just peachy, Sam," Dean replied, "Bobby has just come down to say good night before bed. Say good night, Bobby."

"G'night," muttered Bobby, with the bad grace of children everywhere forced to endure the torturous ritual of bathing prior to retiring for the evening.

"Er, okay, good night, Bobby, see you in the morning," Sam smiled encouragingly. The kid practically curled his lip.

Sam had been planning to take Dean to task over the things he'd let the boy do during the day, including letting Bobby play with exploding bird feeders, and finding a small .22 rifle for him to wage his own small war on the pigeon population – but he took one look at his brother's face, and decided that maybe it could wait until the morning. "I've, er, finished in the kitchen, Dean, I might, er, get back to the research."

"I would be very grateful if you would do that," Dean told him, turning to shepherd Bobby off to bed. "Oh, and perhaps you could bring up some holy water from the basement? Next time, I'm gonna dump a gallon jug in the bath first."

* * *

><p>Reviews are the Soaking Wet Winchester Of Your Choice dripping all over the Kitchen Floor Of Life!<p> 


	4. Chapter 4

SeaGlassGreen - Yes, violent bath time is a recurring theme for me. Having grown up with dogs, horses and a little brother, as well as my own lack of fondness for personal hygiene as a small child, ablution as a full contact martial art is an idiom close to my heart.

Oh, and La Stupenda was 5'10" tall, but she was at least 6'4" wide.

Paralesky and aeicha – Yes, I **do** have something against pigeons – a grudge the size of Antarctica. They are disgusting, stinking, filthy flying vermin. Admittedly, I have encountered some pigeons I liked. They were cooked. Mostly it's their stupidity that offends me. There used to be this pigeon that sat on the window ledge outside my lab and STARED at me. It did that every Spring, for years. Then it laid its eggs on a sloping window ledge with no real nesting material to speak of, and the eggs would roll off and the damned thing would look at me as if it was saying 'WTF did you do with my eggs?' and I would say "Not a damned thing, you idiot bird, you laid them on a SLOPING LEDGE, they ROLLED OFF, stop STARING AT ME you CREEPY FRIGGING BIRD". Tom Lehrer's 'Poisoning Pigeons In The Park' is one of my favourite songs (it's on YouChoob).

This must be set after the gargoyles Tiem and Zan arrived at Singer Salvage, since the implication is that Jimi and Janis are grown up. However, even two gargoyles in residence would not be enough to eliminate the pigeon population entirely – that's just how persistent the damned things are.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 4<strong>

Dean was woken the next morning by a violent earthquake shaking the whole house. No, not an earthquake, he corrected himself; they were in South Dakota, so it was obviously a tornado. Or a crash-landing airliner. Or, it could have been Bobby bouncing enthusiastically on his bed.

"Uncle Dean! Uncle Dean!" the boy yelled. "Get up!"

Dean sprang awake. "What is it?" he demanded, looking around for the threat, "What's wrong Bobby?"

"Good morning, Uncle Dean!" Bobby yelled again, bouncing some more. "Get up! Get up!"

"Huh?" Dean glared at the boy, at the clock, then back at Bobby. "What are you doing up this early?" he demanded, "It's barely light outside!"

"It's time for breakfast," Bobby told him.

"Breakfast doesn't happen until people get out of bed," Dean informed him.

"But I'm hungryyyyyy," whined Bobby.

"Well, go bug Uncle Sammy," smirked Dean, "And he'll prepare you a nice, wholesome breakfast suitable for a growing boy."

"Don't you dare sic him onto meOOOF!" mumbled Sam from his own bed, as Bobby redirected his attack.

"Uncle Sammy!" he chirped, "It's breakfast time!"

"Okay, okay, I'm awake," yawned Sam, "Go get dressed."

"Yaaaaaay!" Bobby burbled, running out of the room with Jimi trotting after him, woofing excitedly.

"Why don't children come fitted with snooze buttons?" grumbled Sam, pulling on his own clothes.

"I never found yours, though God knows I tried," yawned Dean. "When you've fed the kid, you can bring me some eggs and bacon…"

"Like hell, jerk," humphed Sam, throwing his pillow at Dean. "You get your ass downstairs asap."

"I was on Bobby-sitting all day yesterday, the least you can do is let me sleep for a bit while you feed him," insisted Dean. Sam rolled his eyes, and headed downstairs.

Dean was just dozing again when raised voices from the kitchen reached his ears. Sighing, he hauled himself out of bed.

A stand-off was in progress in the kitchen. Sam and Bobby were glaring at each other over a plate and a bowl on the table.

"It's yuck!" declared Bobby, "And I'm not eating it!"

"It's good for you," Sam snapped right back, "And you are going to eat it!"

"I want proper food!" yelled Bobby, "Not this stuff! There isn't even any sugar on the oatmeal!"

"It doesn't need any more sugar," Sam insisted, "You can have an apple sliced into it, if you like, or maybe a banana…"

"Monkeys eat bananas. I don't," Bobby said snippily. "I want proper food!"

"Do you ladies have a good reason for swinging your handbags at each other, or are you just determined to ruin my sleep?" asked Dean, wandering into the kitchen.

Sam glared at him. "I've made breakfast for Bobby, but he can't be that hungry after all, because he's decided he doesn't want it," he told Dean.

"It's not breakfast, it's a crock," humphed Bobby, crossing his arms and glaring up at Sam.

"Look, I had a look at a couple of parenting sites yesterday," Sam told Dean, "And there were some very straighforward articles on simple, nutritious meals for children…"

"Monkey children!" interrupted Bobby.

"…And you certainly shouldn't be feeding them the sort of junk a lot of them want to eat," he finished, with a good airing of Bitchface #9™ (I Know What I'm Doing, Jerk).

"What is that?" asked Dean, giving the thing on the plate a tentative prod with a fork.

"It's a poached egg," Sam told him, "On a piece of toast…"

"It's white elephant booger on a shingle," bobby piped up, "And I'm not eating it! I have my eggs fried, or scrambled, with sausage, and bacon! With biscuits!"

"You are eating poached egg, oatmeal, and fruit!" said Sam firmly. "Children shouldn't eat that sort of garbage!"

"Monkey food, monkey food," chanted Bobby, dropping into an apelike crouch, and capering around the kitchen, "Oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-ook!"

"Bobby…" began Sam.

"Oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-EEEEE!" went Bobby, attempting to pick fleas off himself.

"You better be careful, there, Sam," warned Dean, "If he starts to hurl his own dung, you're in trouble…" Bobby galumphed across to Jimi, and began to search his fur for fleas. He 'found' something, dropped the imaginary insect into his mouth, and smacked his lips.

"Bobby, sit down and eat your breakfast," instructed Sam through clenched teeth.

Bobby bent over, waggled his ass at Sam, and began to blow extravagant sound effect raspberries.

"We might want to try something a bit less, um, wholesome," Dean told his brother.

"We can't let him eat crap! It's not good for him!" objected Sam.

"Well, you grew up living on Lucky Charms, Pop Tarts, frozen waffles, mac & cheese, and spaghettios," Dean reminded him, "And look what happened to you, you grew into a ginormous overgrown Sasquatch."

"That was different!" Sam insisted, "You were a kid looking after a kid, we know better now…"

"And since what he wants for breakfast is what I want for breakfast, it's not going to be a problem," Dean said easily. "Scrambled or fried, Bobby?"

"…_thrrrrrrrrrrrp_… scrambled?" said Bobby hopefully, straightening up.

"No problem, you get the eggs and bacon out," Dean told him, as Bobby smiled, stuck his tongue out, and began to fetch things from the refrigerator. "Oh, come on, Sam," Dean wheedled as Sam gave him a murderous glare, "He'll only be seven for a few days, right? And there's no point dishing up stuff he won't eat."

"That much saturated fat and salt and cholesterol is not good for a child!" Sam was adamant.

"Today, no," agreed Dean, "But Bobby probably had to do a lot more stuff at home than most kids today. You got chores to do at home, Bobby?"

The boy nodded, putting down the eggs. "I got to clean out the dogs' bowls, and fill up their water," he said, "And help feed the pig, and let the chickens out and get the eggs, and bring in the kindling. I got to help Ma with the laundry, if it's a washing day."

"There, you see? An active boy needs a good solid breakfast." Dean started to mix eggs, and Bobby grabbed him around the legs, hugging him happily. "You want us to do you some scrambled egg whites and a no-salt no-sugar-no-fat no-taste yoghurt shake?"

Sam headed for the coffee maker, muttering something about mutiny. Bobby stuck his tongue out at him.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The rain that had been threatening the previous day set in during breakfast – by the time Sam was ready to head off to the study to resume his quest to undo the booby trap, Bobby was running up and down the hall, accompanied by Jimi. He had a cape improvised from a towel, an extra pair of briefs over his pants, and a pair pulled over his head.

"Nnnnnyyow!" he howled, doing another lap, "Look out, everybody, it's… Yfrontman!"

"Bobby," began Sam, sticking his head into the hallway, "I'm trying to do some work here…"

"Bla-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a!" went Bobby, waving an egg-beater at Sam, whizzing the handle around, "Feel the power of my atomic death ray gun!"

"Bobby, I mean it," growled Sam, "I need to be able to hear myself think."

"I can't hear you, you're dead," Bobby informed him smugly.

"Dean!" Sam called to his brother, "Dean, can you come and find something for Bobby to do, he's making... what the hell is that?"

Dean wandered into the hallway. "What's all the yelling for?" he asked.

"Yfrontman just killed Super-Geek the evil genius," announced Bobby, brandishing his egg-beater.

"Dean," asked Sam, "Why are you wearing a colander on your head?"

Dean shrugged. "It's the only way to protect yourself from an atomic death ray gun," he said.

Sam sighed. "Look," he tried again, "Do you think you could find some game to play that doesn't involved thundering up and down the hall, and yelling, and molecular disintegration? Something quieter? There must be something you can do - play cards, Go Fish, or Old Maid, or…" his eye was drawn to Jimi. "Is Jimi wearing a pair of my shorts on his head?"

"That's Shortsdog, Yfrontman's faithful companion," Bobby told him.

"Dean..." rumbled Sam warningly.

"What?" Dean asked him, giving his brother a 'WTF?' look. "I wasn't going to let him put a pair of my shorts on the dog's head."

Sam sighed. "I'm going back to the research," he grumped, "Try to find something to do that keeps the noise below the threshold that destroys human hearing, okay? And get my damned shorts off Jimi's head. And put them in the laundry!"

He spent some time in the study, and by the time he came out again in search of more coffee, he was pretty sure he was making progress. Dean had, apparently, found an indoor activity to keep Bobby occupied and, more importantly, quiet.

They were sitting at the living room table, Dean dealing cards while Bobby watched carefully. Sam smiled to himself, wondering if Dean was letting him win Go Fish the way he had done for his baby brother all those years ago.

He fetched his coffee, and tuned in to the earnest conversation over the cards.

""Give me two."

"Are you sure, Bobby? Here, show me your hand... no, look, you'd be better off hanging onto that one and ditching that one, you're more likely to get another eight than you are to get a straight. See?"

"Okay."

Sam frowned, and made his way into the living room.

"Right, then, so you've got a good hand there, a pair and three eights, so it's worth raising, oh, say two matches..."

"I raise, two matches," Bobby said promptly, pushing two from the pile of matches in front of him into the pot.

"Dean!" spluttered Sam in horror, "Are you teaching him to play _poker_?"

"Yeah," Dean looked up, "We're just playing open hands, until he gets the hang of it."

"You can't teach a child to gamble!" Sam insisted. "What happened to Old Maid, or Go Fish?"

"They're booooriiiiing," droned Bobby dismissively, "This is much more fun! Look, I've won some of Uncle Dean's matches!"

"Come on, Sam," Dean smiled, "Dad taught me to play poker when I was seven..."

"And what a fine, well-adjusted, normal specimen you turned out to be," replied Sam tersely.

"It's harmless," wheedled Dean, "We're only playing for matches."

"Teaching children to gamble is fraught, Dean," insisted Sam, "It induces children to Lie, and cheat, and inculcates bad, possibly addictive habits later in life..."

"Sam, we already know that later in life, Bobby is going to be one of the most cunningly evil poker players the world has ever known," Dean pointed out, "So, no harm done. And anyway, we're being quiet. See how quiet we're being?"

"Why don't you find a book to read, instead?" suggested Sam, "That's quiet. And interesting. And educational. AND it doesn't involve gambling. This, er, house has whole shelves or stuff I liked to read when I was a kid..."

"And what a fine, well-adjusted, normal specimen you turned out to be," remarked Dean snidely.

Sam scowled at him. "No gambling, Dean," he insisted, his most ferocious bitchface firmly in place.

Dean sighed. "Come on, kiddo," he said in a resigned voice, "Uncle Killjoy won't let up until we go do something educational."

Strangely enough, they quite quickly found a book that Bobby became engrossed in. When Sam emerged again, Dean was sitting at the table sharpening a knife, and Bobby sat cross-legged on the floor, absorbed in the illustrations. He smiled.

"So, what are you reading about, Bobby?" he asked.

"Pre-European history," replied Bobby, without looking up.

"You see, Dean?" Sam smirked at his brother, "It is possible for kids to do something constructive, and enjoy themselves at the same time."

Dean smiled back at his brother. "After the debacle of Cowboys and Indians, I thought it would be good for him to learn about some of the people who lived in the Americas before the Europeans arrived," he said. "A balanced view, and all that."

Sam was a little nonplussed. "Well, yes," he agreed, "That's a very sensible thing, kids should know about the civilisations that existed before white settlement."

He might have been more suspicious if he wasn't so preoccupied with the progress he seemed to be making in undoing the de-aging spell...

After lunch, the rain had stopped, and Bobby asked politely if he could go and play outside. The Winchesters looked up to see him clutching a baby doll, missing an arm, that he'd found somewhere.

"Oh, hey, if you want to play tea parties, find someone else, dude," began Dean, "Because that's what girls do..."

"Dean!" hissed Sam. "There's nothing wrong with boys playing with dolls, just like there's nothing wrong with girls playing with toy cars. That sort of appalling gender stereotyping is not acceptable in this day and age!"

"But it's a damned doll, Sam!" complained Dean.

"I don't care!" snapped Sam, "If Bobby wants to play with a doll, then you go out with him, and play with the doll!" He turned back to Bobby. "That's fine, Bobby, Uncle Dean will go out and play with you, won't you, Dean?" Bobby broke into a huge smile, and Dean muttered fratricidally.

Sam returned to his research, smiling to himself at the idea of Bobby playing tea parties, or Mother and Father – he wondered if the boy would make Dean be Mother. That would be worth seeing. He wondered if Bobby still had the box of panto dame dress-ups; maybe the kid would like that, and he could get Dean to be a proper housewife...

He was definitely making progress with the spell, he thought later – he could see how he had to construct the counter-spell. He was so absorbed in cross-referencing two very large books that he didn't notice the smell until it was quite strong.

Sam's head snapped up when he realised that what he could smell was smoke.

He dropped his pen and ran out of the house. "Dean! Bobby!" he called, his demeanour changing from worry to confusion as he found them, and took in the scene before him.

They'd built a sizeable fire out of junk – it was burning slowly and darkly, since a lot of the fuel was damp. The underlying smell of lighter fluid suggested that they'd needed to use an accelerant. Bobby was wearing what looked like an old feather duster on his head, and waving a kitchen spatula. Dean's headgear consisted of an empty cereal box, and he held a battered hubcap which he periodically raised to the sky, with a cry of "Juju! Juju!"

The one-armed baby doll sat amongst the junk on the top of the flaming heap.

Sam gawped for a moment, then asked in a bewildered voice, "What the hell's going on?"

"We are doing an Aztec ritual sacrifice," intoned Bobby, gesturing with his spatula, "I read about it in that book. It had pictures. They cut out people's hearts, and sacrificed them, then set them on fire. To please their gods."

"Juju! Juju!" cried Dean, waggling his hubcap like a Salvation Army marcher playing a tambourine.

Sam seemed struck dumb. "Dean!" he burst out in disbelief, "What do you think you're doing?"

"Hey, don't ask me," shrugged Dean, "He's the Chief Head Priest, I'm just a Lesser Cenobite."

Sam turned a bewildered stare to Bobby. "You're sacrificing baby dolls?" he finally asked.

"It's okay," Bobby assured him, "We stabbed them first, so they're dead when we set them on fire."

"And you're okay with this?" Sam demanded of his big brother.

"You're the one who told me to go and play with Bobby and his doll, whatever he wanted to do," Dean defended himself, "I'm just following orders!"

"Oh, God," Sam dropped his face into his hands. "I don't believe this..."

"Don't let him hear you say that," warned Dean, "Terrible things happen to unbelievers. They get whacked with the Spatula Of Spiritual Authority."

"You're making that up!" snapped Sam.

"Chief Head Priest Bobby, we have an unbeliever present!" declared Dean. "Shall I smite him with the Hubcap Of Religious Correctness?"

Bobby seemed to consider this carefully. "Perhaps just a very small smite," he said generously, "Just to show him the error of his ways. It's all right, Uncle Sammy," he assured Sam, "We won't sacrifice you."

"You better get with the program," Dean waggled the hubcap threateningly, "Before he changes his mind."

Sam let out a long-suffering sigh. "I'm going back inside," he announced sharply, "Don't set anything else on fire!"

"I dunno," mused Dean, "We found what looks like a clown doll, and if you ask me it looks kind of heretical..."

"Idiots," muttered Sam, heading back towards the house, "They're both complete idiots..." He was starting to wonder whether the regress-to-the-level-of-a-seven-year-old thing was actually starting to spread.

* * *

><p>Reviews are the Sacrificial Dollies on the Bonfire in the Backyard Of Life! (Yes, I did used to re-create Aztec ceremonial immolations with my dolls; I blame my mother and grandmother, since they kept giving me dolls, even when I continued to set fire to them regularly.)<p> 


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

"We're back!" announced Dean, as he and Bobby and Jimi came thumping into the house.

"No, really, I would never have guessed," grumbled Sam. "Run out of things to set fire to?"

"The gods made terrible juju on our terrible juju," Dean informed him, sticking his head into the study.

"It started raining again, and put our fire out," translated Bobby, looking around the crowded room, his eyes going wide at the shelves and piles of books of all shapes and sizes.

"Hmmm, maybe I should offer a prayer of thanks to Quetzalcoatl tonight," mused Sam. "Is there any more coffee?"

"Hey, when did I get the job of designated waitress?" asked Dean.

"When you grabbed your smutty bookmark, and made me the designated de-speller," smirked Sam, holding out his coffee mug. Dean took it, threatening to spit in it, and headed for the kitchen.

"Uncle Sammy," began Bobby, still looking around, "Could I have some stuff to draw with?"

Sam regarded the child suspiciously. "Draw?" he repeated. "As in, draw pictures? With pencils? On pieces of paper? The sort of drawing that is quiet, and doesn't involve yelling, running, or setting anything on fire?"

Bobby nodded. "I could draw a picture of someone yelling and running and being set on fire, if you like," he offered.

"No, no, that's fine," replied Sam quickly, scrounging through desk drawers and coming up with a nearly-complete set of pencils and a note pad, "I mean, you can draw a person yelling and running and being set on fire if you want to, although I really don't think it's a suitable topic for someone your age to be illustrating, but drawing is good. It's a good thing to do on a rainy day. Here you go."

"Thanks Uncle Sammy!" smiled Bobby, heading for the living room as Dean reappeared.

"Your devoted and humble servant is here with your coffee, O Great Master," he intoned, bowing, "May he approach your superior presence and present it to you? Must he shuffle on his knees in your magnificent presence, or..."

"Just give it here," snarked Sam, sipping at it carefully.

"How's it going?" he asked, looking over the books and notes Sam had laid out.

"I think I can see what I gotta do," Sam said, "Finally. If you can just keep Bobby occupied for another day or so, we can get him back to his normal smartass self, as opposed to his seven-year-old smartass self."

"I think he's a good kid," Dean told him. "Okay, a little bit hyperactive around the edges, and not very fond of soap and water, but he's okay. He's fun!"

"Fun?" Sam glared at his brother. "He's noisy, he's rude, and he won't do what he's told! And, he has a fascination with things that involve mess, explosions, or gore."

"Yeah," agreed Dean, "He's a seven-year-old kid."

"He should be old enough to know how to behave himself," insisted Sam.

"You really do need to relax a bit," Dean declared, "Just go with the flow a bit more. You know, just put the colander on your head, be more like an uncle, less like a Puritan Sunday School teacher – 'if it's fun, it's sinful'."

"Well, right now, he's doing some drawing, which is a perfect activity for a kid his age," Sam said, "He can use his imagination, without breaking, throwing, or setting fire to anything."

Dean left Sam to the research, and made his way to the living room. "Whatcha doing, kiddo?" he asked.

Bobby had another one of Sam's Approved For Bobby's Perusal history book open on the table, at a particularly lurid illustration. "I'm drawing a gladiator," he said, "Getting his legs chopped off."

Dean eyed the drawing critically. "That's pretty good," he said thoughtfully, "But where's the lion?"

"Lion?" asked Bobby.

"Oh, yeah, the Romans had lions," Dean went on, "And tigers, and all sorts of wild animals. They got them to eat people. For the amusement of the crowd.

"Really?" Bobby's eyes were wide. "That's... cool." He looked at the picture in the book. "Did the Romans have flying saucers?"

Dean considered this. "They didn't know about flying saucers," he answered, "But that might be because the flying saucers were using their alien technology to stay invisible."

"That would make sense," nodded Bobby, "Because they didn't want to get eaten by the lions."

"Or get their antennae chopped off by the gladiators," added Dean. That clearly gave Bobby food for thought; he drew a speech bubble from one of the gladiators, and laboriously printed in it: **Credo orbis volantes existere**. _(I think flying saucers are real)_.

Dean raised his eyebrows. "You know Latin?" he marvelled. "You should say something to Sam, that'll really mess with his head."

"Does he speak Latin?" asked Bobby.

"Yeah, he knows all sorts of stuff," grinned Dean. "He's Super-Geek, the evil genius, remember? Tell him his fly is undone, or something."

"Is Uncle Sammy always so grumpy?" queried Bobby.

"No, no, he's not. Well, he's usually annoyed by something I'm doing, at any given time," admitted Dean, "But he's just really busy at the moment, busy and worried."

"He should probably eat more," Bobby stated, "I saw what he had for lunch. It was a sandwich with a whole lotta salad in it. It was practically all lettuce! And he tried to make me eat one!"

"Yeah, I think he just wants you to be healthy," Dean said with a smile, "But PB&Js are better."

"Bobby nodded. "What's he doing? That makes him so grumpy, I mean."

"Well," began Dean carefully, "There's this guy who's in trouble, he's a good friend of ours, and Sam knows all sorts of stuff that can help people in this sort of situation, so he's doing some research to fix this guy's problem. It's a really tricky problem, so he's a bit anxious about it."

"Helping people is cool," Bobby decided, "Like firemen, and doctors." He screwed up his nose. "My Grandma wants me to be a priest," he confided, "That's why she makes me learn Latin, with Father Flaherty, and the other altar boys." The boy shuddered visibly.

"Dude, not cool," agreed Dean. "Priests aren't allowed to have girlfriends."

"I don't want a girlfriend," Bobby said firmly, his face wrinkling in disgust, "Girls are dumb. But priests have to wear dresses. I don't want to wear a dress. Although Father does get to drink the leftover wine, and that always seems to make him very happy, and lots of ladies bake him stuff. He's always getting cakes, and cookies. That bit would be cool."

Having discussed the pros and cons of a religious vocation, Bobby decided to make the aliens visible to everyone at the Coliseum. He worked intensely on his drawings with hardly a peep after that. Dean smiled, and went on with some weapons maintenance. The boy was so absorbed that he hardly noticed when Sam came to seek Dean's assistance to fetch some items from the attic for the counter-spell. He was clearly totally occupied, so they left him to it.

Bobby heard them banging around in the roof, the occasional 'thump' or cussword filtering back downstairs, as he considered his masterpiece, a panoramic shot of an arena in which gladiators with swords did battle with aliens with atomic death ray guns (he put colanders on the gladiators' heads, to even things up a bit).

He decided he'd draw a picture for Uncle Sammy, to try to cheer him up a bit. He drew his uncle, sitting at the desk covered in books, while Uncle Dean brought him a cup of coffee. He drew a speech bubble, with Uncle Dean asking **Quomodo cogis comas tuas sic videri?** _(How do you get your hair to do that?)._

The problem was, he'd blunted some of his pencils on his other drawing, especially the red pencil, what with having to draw in so much blood. Still, it wasn't too much of a problem. He was pretty sure he could find a pencil sharpener in Uncle Sammy's study; there was no need to pester the grown-ups over such a small thing, especially when they were obviously busy. And he didn't want to interrupt Uncle Sammy while he was trying to do work to help somebody. He took the red pencil (and the green and purple ones, which had done extensive alien-drawing duty) and headed for the study.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Why is this stuff always in the last damned place you look?" griped Dean, sneezing at the dust that they'd stirred up.

"Why can't these damned spells call for stuff that's closest to the door?" added Sam, brushing fruitlessly at the fluff settling on his shirt and in his hair. "Why Bobby doesn't have some sort of filing system for everything is beyond me. It would be really useful to know what's up here, and where it is."

"Well, maybe that's a little project you could undertake when this is over," suggested Dean, pulling a tarpaulin off an indistinct pile. "Hey, look at this!" Dean brandished an elderly pogo stick. "We should take this down for Bobby."

"Just so long as he doesn't try to set it on fire," muttered Sam. "Now, we need birch heartwood and I'm pretty sure Bobby had a jar of dried anemone flowers up here..."

_Ponk-ponk-ponk-ponk-ponk_

Sam turned to see his Dean grinning madly, and boinging up and down on the pogo stick.

"Dean, will you stop that?" he demanded. "We're looking for spell ingredients!"

"I can look and bounce," Dean defended, "In fact, I can look on the higher shelves at apogeeOW!" His bouncing brought his head into sharp contact with a low-hanging beam.

"Serves you right," smirked Sam. "We're looking for a large box, like a tea chest. It has a hinged lid, it's really heavy, and it contains..."

"Fear not, King Sammy," intoned Dean, striking an heroic pose as he sat astride a rather tattered looking hobby horse with a bucket on his head, "Your faithful knight, Sir Hotstuff, shall ride the length and breadth of the land, looking for the things you require..."

"Great, you're catching seven-years-old from Bobby," Sam rolled his eyes, moving another box of stuff and sneezing at the cloud of dust that whoofed up into the air.

"Bobby's right, you are grumpy," humphed Dean, putting down his steed.

"I'm not grumpy!" snapped Sam. Dean grinned infuriatingly. "Look, I just want to get him changed back to his adult self. And I want him to stay healthy until then. Can you imagine how annoyed he'd be if he gets turned back, and realises he has a broken arm, or singed off eyebrows, or a gatrointestinal disturbance brought on by too much bacon grease, or something?"

"He would use the word 'idjit' with extreme prejudice," conceded Dean, poking at a heap of junk. He picked up a metal apparatus with a pistol grip that didn't immediately suggest a purpose for itself. "What the hell is this? Some sort of gun for firing spoons? A torture instrument? A homework motivator?"

"It's a Victorian surgical implement, a tonsil guillotine," answered Sam.

"I don't even want to know how you know that," shuddered Dean. "I can't help but wonder what Bobby has it for, though... hey, is this it?"

"Ah, finally," Sam sighed with relief, "Give me a hand here." They heaved at the dark wooden lid, and Sam poked through the box, retrieving the items he'd need.

"Come on then," he said to Dean, who followed him with the pogo stick, "We'd better see what he's up to now."

"He was just drawing," Dean said, "Gladiators. And aliens. Speaking Latin."

Sam looked intrigued. "Bobby speaks Latin already?"

Dean nodded. "Apparently, his grandmother has plans for him to become a man of the cloth."

Sam grinned at that. "I wonder what went wrong? We'll have to ask him." He gestured to the pogo stick. "Just don't let him use that indoors. He'll threaten to skin us if we let him mark up the floors to hell while he's a kid."

"Hey, Bobby!" called Dean, "Look what we found in the attic!"

The living room was empty. Two drawings sat on the table, the gladiators vs. aliens one, and an outline of the Winchesters in the study. Dean glanced at them, and smiled. "You know, he's really got your hair right," he grinned.

"Where is he?" wondered Sam.

"He won't have gone far," shrugged Dean, he's probably in the kitchen, looking for cookies or something..."

He was about to head for the kitchen, when they heard a young voice confidently speaking Latin from the study. "Ab initio, ad aeterno _... _Tempus fugit._... _"Aut vincere tempus aut mori..."

"Bobby!" they yelled in unison, sprinting for the study.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It was an amazing room; Uncle Sammy had even more books than Father Flaherty, and that was saying something. They looked a lot more interesting than the ones Father Flaherty – or, as Bobby and the other altar boys liked to call him, Father Farty – read from. They had titles with words like 'monsters' and 'spirits' and 'werewolves', heavy gold or black print on thick leather hardbindings, and other things he couldn't pronounce and had never heard of. Bobby wondered if he'd be allowed to look at some of these books.

Uncle Sammy had half a dozen books open, and pages of notes strewn about, on the desk. Curious, he climbed up onto the chair, and looked more closely at some of the books. He felt a little bit proud to realise that he recognised the texts written in English and Latin. His grandmother would be proud.

He peered carefully at one old book, the page crammed with ornate writing in fading ink. "Eheu, fugaces labuntur anni," he read, tracing the letters with a finger. _Alas, the fleeting years slip away._ There were other bits he could understand, too. "Ab initio, ad aeterno" _From the beginning until eternity... _"Tempus fugit." _Time flies... _"Aut vincere tempus aut mori."_ Either to defeat time, or to die..._

He heard his uncles call his name, and turned to see them both running into the study, their faces horrified. He didn't see the flash of blue light as Uncle Dean got to him first, grabbing him up from the chair and throwing him to the carpet.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It was just like Dean, Sam thought later, to go rushing into possible danger to save someone else with no thought for his own safety. Usually, Sam would tear Dean a new one over such a stunt afterwards. He didn't know why he bothered, really – Dean never stopped being the hero, but at least yelling at him afterwards made him feel better.

However, this time, yelling at Dean would have to wait.

"Oh, Dean," he sighed, "What have you done?"

The small blonde boy standing in a puddle of denim, wearing a tee-shirt so large it was practically falling off him, turned a pair of large green eyes on him. The freckled face burst into a huge smile as the child stepped out of the fallen jeans, ran across the room, and hugged his legs tightly, beaming up at him.

"Uncle Sammy!"

* * *

><p>Reviews are the Unexpected Pogo Sticks in the Attic Of Life! (Srsly, reviews make the plot bunnies whisper louder.)<p> 


	6. Chapter 6

...So many of my stories seem to revolve around giving Dean a hard time, maybe I just need to try in a little Sam torturing to even things up a bit...

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 6<strong>

"Okay," said Sam calmly, to himself more than anything, "Okay, the important thing here, is to stay calm. He's just a kid now, and yelling at him will frighten him. He can't be more than six..."

"I'm seven, Uncle Sammy!" Dean piped determinedly, looking up at Sam.

"Oh, er, sorry, um, Dean," replied Sam distractedly, wondering at whatever quirk of the spell had left Dean thinking of him as his uncle. "It's been a long time since I've, um, seen you, and you've grown so much since then, I kind of... forgot."

"That's okay," said Dean graciously, "Why are you feet so big?"

"What? Oh, I guess it's because, um, the rest of me is big," answered Sam in bemusement. "So, then," he tried to force some jollity into his tone, "Dean, you remember your, er, cousin, Bobby..."

"Hi Dean!" said Bobby, with a big smile. The fact his 'uncle' was now his seven-year-old 'cousin' didn't seem to faze him at all.

"Hiya Bobby!" Dean replied.

"Okay, that's good," Sam nodded, "Now, Bobby, were you reading the book with the Latin in it? I just need to know which parts you were reading..."

"Have you seen how big Uncle Sammy's feet are?" Dean asked Bobby, pointing at Sam's shoes.

"...And from now on," Sam fixed both boys with what he hoped was an avuncular-but-authoritative look, "No reading any of the books in here, okay, because..."

"I never really looked at 'em before," conceded Bobby, joining Dean in contemplation of Sam's feet, "But you're right. They're _huge_."

"...Because the books in here are, er, special," Sam went on, "Some of them are, uh, rare, and irreplaceable, so..."

"Does that make him a Bigfoot?" Dean wondered out loud, contemplating Sam's right foot seriously.

"...I'd like you two boys to stay out of here, okay?" Sam persisted, "While I'm working, because..."

"I don't think Bigfoots are real," declared Bobby, bending over to peer more carefully at his 'uncle' 's shoes, "But they'd have to be real hairy. Because of the snow, and all."

"...It's really important that I figure out this particular, uh, problem," Sam ploughed on doggedly, getting the distinct feeling that they weren't really listening to him, "Because I have to help out a, er, friend..."

"He's tall enough," Dean said, eyeing Sam critically, "And his hair is pretty, well, hairy."

"Yeah. Shaggy. We'd better check, then," Bobby decided.

"...So why don't we find something for you boys to do while I HEY!" He yelped as both boys knelt, and started to try to remove his shoes. "Hey, cut that out!"

"We have to check your feet, Uncle Sammy," Dean told him matter-of-factly, undoing the lace, "To see if you're a Bigfoot."

"What? No!" yelped Sam. "I'm not a Bigfoot! Bobby is right, there is no such thing as Bigfoot."

"Maybe you're just tryin' to hide your secret identity," Bobby said archly, tugging at Sam's other shoe, "And you're just sayin' that so we won't find you out, and sell you to a zoo."

"Look, I'm not a Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti, Yowie, Nuk-luk, Chuchunya, or any other sort of hominoid cryptid," Sam insisted, "And right now I think we should get Dean into some clothes that actually fit him... hey, stop it!"

"He won't lift his foot up," complained Dean, tugging at Sam's shoe. Bobby reached over, pushed the legs of Sam's jeans up, grabbed a pinch of leg hair, and yanked.

"AAAARGH!" yowled Sam, pulling his leg away from painful epilation. Dean deftly pulled his shoe off.

"Aha!" he said in triumph, "Look how hairy his legs are." He grabbed hold of Sam's sock.

Sam leaned down, and slapped his hands away. "Stop it!" he demanded, "Stop it right now! I am not a Bigfoot! Stop trying to pull my shoes off! Give me that!" He snatched his shoe away from Dean, and shuffled backwards without lifting his feet. "Now, as I was saying," he huffed, hopping on one foot while he put his shoe back on, "We need to get Dean dressed, then we'll find you two something to do so I can get some work done, okay?"

Dean and Bobby exchanged a look that worried Sam. It suggested a willingness to bide their time.

Taking their silence as assent, he reached out to take Dean's hand. "Okay, then, let's go upstairs, and get some..."

He turned and stumbled, tripping over the untied laces of his left shoe.

The two small boys pounced on his legs, wrestled his shoes off, and sped out of the study.

"Hey!" he called after them, picking himself up off the floor, "Hey! Bring back my shoes!"

The sound of giggling and small feet thumping up the stairs suggested he had a different sort of hunt on his hands in the immediate future.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Right then," huffed Sam, watching Dean pull the shirt over his head, "So, now you're dressed, we need to talk about what you guys are going to do while I work."

"What work are you doing?" asked Dean.

"Well, I'm helping a, uh, a couple of friends with a problem they have," Sam told him, "I have to figure out how to fix it for them."

"Uncle Sammy helps people, like firemen and doctors and nurses and stuff," announced Bobby.

"Hey, that's really cool," smiled Dean. "Can we help?"

Sam smiled down at them. "Yes, you sure can!" he enthused. "I need to be able to read, and think, and do research to figure stuff out for this problem, so you guys can be a really big help by being nice and quiet!" He smiled brightly.

The two boys didn't look very impressed.

"That doesn't sound like much fun," said Bobby dubiously.

"If we go outside, you won't hear us at all," suggested Dean.

"No, it's raining, and you'll get filthy," commented Sam. Both boys drooped visibly. "Come on, there's lots of things you can do inside!" Sam told them, "You can read, you can draw, you can write letters to some important people, you can have a paper airplane contest..."

"Can we do painting?" asked Dean hopefully.

"No, I don't think painting would be a good idea," replied Sam, getting a mental picture of the sort of redecorating two small unsupervised boys could get up to – not even the dogs would be safe. "It's too messy."

"There's nothing wrong with messy," muttered Bobby seditiously.

"I know, what about dress-ups?" suggested Sam. "Bobby's got... er, I mean, there's a whole box of stuff you could dress up with, it's downstairs, I can get it for you..."

That got a bit more of a response, so he hauled the box of Bobby's panto dame clothes out of storage, and left it in the living room for them. Both boys immediately started hauling items out, flinging them around, marvelling at the gaudy fabrics.

"Well, then, I'll leave you guys to it," Sam sighed in relief as Bobby grinningly brandished a garish wig. "Try not to break anything, okay?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they chorused obediently, diving back into the box.

Sam smiled to himself. The parenting websites he'd consulted had all been big on providing children with props to play with, then letting them make up their own games. Unstructured play gave them a chance to improvise, use their imaginations, and required such desirable behaviours as sharing and co-operation.

While they were engrossed in the dress-ups box, he took the opportunity to head upstairs and retrieve his shoes – Dean had hidden them in the same place, under his bed, as he'd stashed stuff when he was seven years old. He headed back down to the study.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam had been working for about twenty minutes, when he heard a sudden blood-curdling yell from the living room. He was on his feet, heading for the living room immediately.

"Dean! Bobby!" he called, "What is it?"

He burst into the living room, to be hit in the face with a pair of balled up socks.

"Look out, Yfrontman!" bellowed Dean, "It's another Super-Geek!"

Sam gawped. Bobby had reprised his Yfrontman costume, but had upgraded from a towel to a purple sequinned slip for a cape. Dean, on the other hand, had found a red lacy foundation garment that looked like it had been constructed by an engineer more accustomed to building reinforced geodesic domes out of concrete, after having seen a lot of episodes of Wonder Woman at an impressionable age. They had made a figure out of cushions on the sofa and dressed it in a blue blouse and shaggy wig, and drawn a face that bore an alarming resemblance to his own. They had apparently been pelting it with pairs of socks, but his entrance to the living room gave them a more inviting target.

"Curses!" shouted Bobby, "He must've used his evil genius to construct a robot double in his secret laboratory! Use your boobie-cannon, Braboy!"

"Boobi-da-boobi-da-boobi-da-boobi-da," went Dean, waggling his chest and the awful unmentionable at him. Sam stepped back in bemusement.

"What the hell are you two doing?" he demanded in bewilderment, "It sounded like someone was being murde-FAFF!" Another pair of socks, of dubious cleanliness, hit him in the face. "Oh, gross!"

"The stench grenades work on him, Yfrontman!" declared Dean in triumph, "Hit him with your atomic death ray gun!"

"Bla-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a!" went Bobby, whizzing the egg-beater handle. "Die, evil fiend!"

"Hey! HEY!" Sam grabbed a child by the scruff in each hand. "Knock it off! I told you I have work to do, I thought something was wrong, with all the yelling."

"Aaaaaaaargh! Heeeeeeeeelp!" Bobby squirmed in his grasp.

"Save us, Shortsdog! Save us!" wailed Dean, wiggling furiously.

"QUIET!" barked Sam, "Look, you can find something quieter to do, because..."

He looked up to see Jimi thundering towards them, huge doggy grin on his face, apparently intent on joining in whatever hilarious game the humans were playing.

"Did you put my shorts on his head again?" demanded Sam. "Jimi, come here..."

With an eager whuff, the dog leaped at him, keen to take part in the wrestling. His weight hit Sam, and pushed him over.

"AAAAARGH! Get off me!" Sam batted at the dog, who wagged his tail and kissed his Second lavishly. "And give me those... you two stop that!" he bellowed, as he realised that Bobby and Dean were once again sitting on his legs, and attempting to remove his shoes. He grabbed a child in each hand. "Right, we are going to have a talk..."

Yfrontman and Braboy each pushed up a trouser leg, grabbed leg hair, and struck simultaneously at the only known weakness of Super-Geek the evil genius.

"AAAARGH!" yelled Sam in pain, as the Underwear Avengers brandished a handful of hairs each in triumph. "Right, that is ENOUGH!" He grabbed a child in each hand, and turned them around to face him. "Stop it!" he stormed, "Stop this right now! Stop being so noisy, stop throwing dirty laundry around, stop trying to pull my damned shoes off, and stop trying to pull hair out of my legs!"

Both boys stared up at him, faces aghast at the raging giant in front of them.

Sam took a deep breath. "Look," he tried again, "I have work to do, and I can't get anything done if you're yelling and screaming and making noise, and throwing dirty socks around, which is unhygienic, and trying to steal my shoes, which is just weird, so... find something to do that doesn't involve screaming the house down. Dean, please take off that bra, it's totally disturbing."

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," said Dean in a small unhappy voice, wriggling out of his costume, big green eyes gazing forlornly up at him.

"Bobby, put the egg beater back in the kitchen, it's a cooking utensil, not a toy," he frowned.

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," said Bobby quietly, visibly drooping.

"Okay, that's better. So, you guys find something quiet to do now, okay?" he suggested. "Why don't you have a quietness contest? To see which one of you can be the quietest?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," the chorused, sounding thoroughly miserable.

"That would be good. Thank you," he finished, returning to the study. Yep, that went well, he told himself, I established the parental figure authority firmly and fairly. It's reasonable to ask them to play quietly. As the one remaining adult, I am in charge here. It's up to me to exercise control, for their own good. Whether they like it or not.

Sam sat down and pulled the witch's grimoire towards himself. Yep, I did a good job. I don't feel like a total asshole for ruining their game at all, nope, no sir, no assholeness to see here, move along folks...

The mental picture of two large, sad pairs of eyes looking up at him in disappointment would not go away.

"Fuck," he muttered to himself twenty minutes later, "Maybe I should organise a game for them, get them started, then leave them to it, once they're underway." He pushed himself back from the desk and stood up.

Then fell down.

He worked out later that Bobby and Dean had taken him at his word, and had a quietness contest. The aim of the contest was to crawl as quietly as possible into the study, and under the desk, without being noticed. Some of the adult Hunters' skills must've stayed with them as kids, because one of the little bastards had tied his laces together.

"Ow!" he yelped.

He distinctly heard stifled giggling outside the door.

"Dean, Bobby, I know you're there," he told them, sitting up and untangling his shoelaces. The two culprits smiled at him.

"We were real quiet, Uncle Sammy," beamed Dean.

"Yeah, you were," agreed Sam. "You were definitely quiet."

"It's stopped raining," pointed out Bobby, "Can we go outside?"

"Yeah, okay," agreed Sam, "Just stay near the house, and don't set anything on fire. Don't play any games that might get anybody hurt. I expect you to act like big boys, be sensible and responsible."

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they chorused dutifully, before heading out into the yard.

Sam watched them go with a smile. The websites had suggested that sometimes, giving children responsibility for their own conduct was A Good Thing, implying that he trusted them to behave themselves – treat them like 'big boys', and they'd behave like 'big boys'. He'd told them to be careful, not set fire to anything, and to play safe, and they'd seemed to respond positively to that. Maybe that approach was going to work better with these two than the Parent-Figure As Benevolent Dictator model. With a relieved sigh, he went back to the study.

* * *

><p>If any of the Denizens have a Sam foot fetish, I'm not sure it's suitable for me to write anything too hinky when there are seven-year-olds involved... exactly how do you test for Bigfootness? I couldn't find anything, so unless one of our Merkin friends can explain it, I'll have to make something up. Which is usually what seven-year-olds do anyway.<p> 


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

"It's all wet," Bobby observed gloomily, kicking at a clump of weeds, "Nothing will burn when it's all wet like this."

"Uncle Sammy said not to set stuff on fire," Dean reminded him, "So we'd better not. He's kinda grumpy already."

"You still think he might be a Bigfoot?" asked Bobby curiously. " 'Cause you're right, his feet are really, really big."

"He could be," said Dean cautiously.

"How do we find out for sure?" Bobby wanted to know.

"Well, you have to, kind of, test, you know, for Bigfootness," asserted Dean.

"How do you do that?" asked Bobby, clearly interested.

"Well, first, obviously, you have to look at the feet, and see just how big they really are," Dean told him authoritatively, "It's best if you can get an outline, or a footprint, to study. Then, you have to check how hairy they are. They're shy about their feet, 'cause usually, they don't want people to know what they are."

"I bet they make a noise, you know, a Bigfoot noise, if you poke 'em," added Bobby.

"Yeah, yeah, they do," nodded Dean sagely, "And a real Bigfoot will always deny being a Bigfoot, because they don't want to get found out."

Bobby looked thoughtful. "Plus, there's the hairiness thing," he said. "I bet Bigfoot hair has a certain smell to it, if you set it on fire."

"Yeah, totally," agreed Dean.

"Uncle Sammy is kinda hairy," Bobby mused, "On his head, and on his legs." He looked at Dean. "Maybe we should try to check him Bigfootness."

"That would probably be sensible," Dean said, "Just so we know. In case anybody tried to take him away from us. Then we can protect him. As Yfrontman and Braboy. Shortsdog will help."

Bobby frowned. "Isn't he the evil genius Super-Geek?" he asked.

"Well, yeah, but... that's his secret identity. Being a Bigfoot is his _secret _secret identity!" Dean insisted.

"We'll have to be sneaky about it," decided Bobby, "You've seen how he reacts when we try to check his feet."

"Well, we'll have to think up a plan," agreed Dean, looking around at the yard. "He's on the alert now, so we'll have to wait. What do you wanna do?"

"It's too wet for football," decided Bobby, kicking at the ground, "And a ball won't bounce." He picked up the Hubcap of Religious Correctness, and frisbeed it across the yard. It landed flat, and skidded across the wet ground. Dean watched it thoughtfully.

"Well, we need something that doesn't have to bounce," he announced. "If we get something that slides instead, that'll work."

They found a number of candidate items, including a piece of plastic sheeting, a piece of plywood, and a small sheet of roofing tin. A few experiments established that the piece of tin slid most easily across the wet vegetation and ground. Conveniently, it already had holes in it, so they were able to tie a piece of rope to the corners.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

When Sam heard the noise start up, he immediately wondered what had set the dogs off. Then he realised it wasn't the dogs, and wondered if someone was torturing Hellhounds nearby. Then he realised that it wasn't Hellhounds being tortured, it was two children's voices doing impersonations of Hellhounds being tortured.

When he opened the door, he was met with the sight of Bobby and Dean, in full howling cry. Jimi sat patiently on a piece of tin, to which they had attached a piece of rope. They were towing him up and down a clear area on a the makeshift sled.

"So, er, what's going on, guys?" he asked, coming to the bottom of the stairs.

"This is Sir Jimi Jimington, the famous explorer," explained Dean, "And we are Deano and Bobby Boy, his famous sled dogs."

"We are taking him on his famous expedition to explore the North Pole, "added Bobby, "We pull his sled, and hunt down any wolves or bears that try to attack him."

"Er, there aren't any wolves or bears at the actual North Pole," Sam pointed out.

"That's because we hunted them all down," said Dean smugly, "And tore them into little pieces. And ate them. Even the bones."

"Wow," said Sam, smiling indulgently, "Well, it's a pleasure to meet you, Sir Jimi." Jimi graciously shook hands. "I think that exploring the North Pole is a wonderful idea," he went on, "But I think I should point out that, in the freezing temperatures, sled dogs don't make much noise – the air is too cold, and it hurts their lungs if they bark and howl too loudly, so mostly, they pant. I wouldn't want the famous Deano and Bobby Boy to get sore lungs," he said solicitously. "They might get sick, and have to stay inside, in their kennel, instead of exploring."

They might only have been seven years old, but Deano and Bobby Boy were capable of recognising a threat when it promised to disrupt their game.

"Okay, we'll try to be good sled dogs," conceded Dean, Bobby nodded. To show willing, they stuck their tongues out, and panted.

"I can see that you are very good sled dogs," Sam told them, "So I'll leave you to your sled. Good luck, Sir Jimi, and safe trip."

"Woof woof!" said Dean. Bobby elbowed him.

Sam went back inside, smiling to himself. It was perfect: they'd found a harmless game to play, and he'd convinced them to keep the noise down, without spoiling their fun. With a bit of luck, they'd tire themselves out towing a very large dog up and down on their 'sled'. If they were still looking for something to do, he could get them to draw pictures of their North Pole visit – he was pretty sure there were a couple of books that would be educational for them to look at, broaching the subjects of zoology and geography of the Arctic Circle. Maybe they could write short letters to the paper, about the trip. He might even submit the 'North Pole Explorer game' to that parenting site that asked readers for their ideas for games kids could play that didn't involve TV or electronics.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Deano and Bobby Boy the famous sled dogs towed Sir Jimi Jimington around for a bit longer, until they'd decided they'd had enough.

"I declare this the North Pole," announced Dean, jamming a stick with a large leaf poked onto the top of it into the mud, while Bobby saluted. "So now, it's time to go back home."

"I'm not towin' him all the way back home," muttered Bobby mutinously, "He weighs a ton! Why can't he tow us?"

"He won't have to," Dean reassured him, "We're at the North Pole, so wherever we go from here, it's downhill. We can, you know, toboggan home!"

Bobby looked around at the flat ground. "We can't toboggan," he pointed out, "We don't actually have a hill."

"Not here, we don't," Dean conceded, grinning as he looked across the yard to the sloping ground beyond the car bodies. "But over there, we do."

They towed their sled to the hill, after evicting Jimi – he seemed to be right at home with the idea of being carted about. There was a broad, flattish track down the middle of it, which Dean eyed critically.

"I think if we point it down there, that way, it'll work," he decided.

After a brief argument about who would 'drive' first – Dean insisted that he should, since he'd thought up the idea – the sat themselves on the piece of tin, and pushed off with their feet.

"Wheeeeeeee!" went two young voices as they shot down the hill. The arrived at the bottom, red-cheeked and grinning.

"That was awesome!" enthused Dean.

"It's my turn to drive," insisted Bobby.

They took turns at piloting their tin down the hill a few times, until disaster struck; a rusted corrugation down the centre of the sheet finally gave way as they towed it back up the hill.

"Balls," grumbled Bobby, inspecting their bisected sled. The pieces were too small to use, and a quick search failed to turn up another suitable piece.

"Maybe we could use the plastic, you know, sit on it, and hold onto it? Like a waterslide?" suggested Dean.

"If we had a proper waterslide, we wouldn't need the plastic," Bobby pointed out. They both studied the slope thoughtfully. Their zooming descents had flattened out and carved a smooth, muddy track that was almost free of vegetation...

The thought about buckets, but that would have been hard work, and awkward. There were a number of hoses in one of the sheds, though, which were easy enough to join together, once they untangled them and figured out how the fittings worked. They ran it to the top of the slope, and turned on the water.

"How wet does it have to be?" asked Bobby.

"Wet enough to slide," grinned Dean, pacing out his run-up carefully. He judged his approach, started to run, then threw himself flat at the last minute as the slope dropped away.

Bobby watched in amazement as Dean supermanned all the way to the bottom of the hill at astonishing speed.

"That was awesome!" he shouted from the bottom of the hill. "You try it!"

Bobby did.

"That's really cool," he grinned, "Let's do it some more!"

So they did, with Jimi barking eagerly as the boys ran up the slope, then slid down the mud slide they'd made.

It was so much fun, they did that for the rest of the afternoon, until Uncle Sammy called them in.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Dean! Bobby!" Sam called a bit anxiously, seeing that they were no longer in the immediate environs of the house. He relaxed when he got an immediate reply.

"Coming, Uncle Sammy!" yelled a young voice, accompanied by the sounds of two small pairs of feet running in his direction.

"So, how did the exploring go?" he called, "Did you make it to the North Po-HOLY SHIT!"

His first thought was to wonder where they'd read about New Guinea's Asaro Mud-men, because barring the intricate clay masks, that's just what they looked like.

His second thought was, how the hell was he supposed to get them into the house without coating the entire place in mud?

He went with Thought Number Three.

"_What the hell have you been doing?_" he demanded, eyeing them in horror.

"When we got to the North Pole, we went exploring a volcano," explained Dean, grinning up at him.

"You are totally filthy!" Sam tried to keep his voice from becoming too shrill.

"It was a very dirty volcano," added Bobby, picking absently at the mud in his hair.

"There are no volcanoes at the North Pole!" insisted Sam, waving his arms.

"That's because nobody's ever found it before now," Dean told him, with a roll of his eyes, "That's what explorers do. They explore, and find things that nobody's seen before."

"Oh. My. God." Sam ran a hand through his hair. "Right. You need to have a bath. Right now."

"What?" asked Bobby in disbelief, "I had a bath just last night! I don't need another one!"

"You are covered in mud, and God knows what else!" Sam glowered at them, "And you definitely need a bath!"

"It's just a bit of mud," Dean objected, "It'll wipe off, and..."

"Bath! Now!" instructed Sam.

"No!" chorused the boys, crossing their arms and glowering right back.

"Take your shoes and socks off out here," instructed Sam through clenched teeth, "Then you are going to head straight upstairs to the bathroom, without touching anything."

"Nuh-uh," growled Dean, bottom lip coming perilously close to a pout.

"If you do not have your shoes and socks off and your sorry... selves headed up those stairs by the time I count to three, I will be very annoyed," muttered Sam ominously, one eye starting to twitch.

Bobby blew a raspberry at him.

"Oh, God," Sam dropped his head into his hands. "Look," he tried for a conciliatory tone, "If you guys behave, and go upstairs and get clean, we can do something fun tonight after dinner."

"Like what?" demanded Dean suspiciously.

"Well, the Attenborough 'Life On Earth' series is on, we could sit down and watch that," Sam suggested, a little desperately, "Or we could play cards, Go Fish, or Sevens, or even Snap..."

"Booooriiiiing," yawned Bobby.

"Attenborough sucks ass," opined Dean.

"Why me?" muttered Sam. "How about if we make popcorn? Maybe have some ice-cream?"

"Can we watch Evil Dead?" asked Dean hopefully.

"What? No!" Sam barked, "That is not suitable for children your age!"

"No deal, dude," sniffed Dean, crossing his arms a little tighter.

Sam sighed. The websites suggested that bribery was not a good idea, although it might be used occasionally as a last resort. Using patient insistence and reasoning was better, and would not escalate into unreasonable demands.

Fuck the website, decided Sam, those people had obviously never had to deal with deaged Bobby and Dean.

"Gentleman," he announced, "Bathtime is about to occur. Please ensure that your seatbelts are fastened, remove all sharp objects from your pockets, and assume the crash position."

"What does that mean?" demanded Bobby.

"It means, bend over and kiss your ass goodbye," answered Sam grimly, grabbing a squirming, yelling child under each arm and heading upstairs.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The lock on the door was old, and heavy; Bobby hadn't bothered to keep it oiled since they were kids, since it no longer mattered that seven-year-old fingers couldn't manipulate it.

The tub was old, stained, but large. Sam was grateful for both these things.

He set the water running, put his back against the door, then grabbed the nearest protesting, wriggling child, and removed a piece of clothing. When that one squirmed out of his grip, he grabbed the other one, and repeated the procedure. He did this until he had them out of their clothes.

"In. Now." he instructed.

"Bite me," chorused the terrible twosome.

In the end, it was easiest to squirt some shower gel into the water, then grab them one at a time and dunk the outraged and yelling kid in the bath like a howling, wiggling tea bag. He could only do one at a time, because as soon as he let go of one, the boy would shoot out of the bath and be trying to open the door. The water quickly turned a dirty brown colour, and he had to rinse them off under the shower, spluttering and yelling and splashing like demons being sprayed with holy water (only not that subtle).

Finally, after what seemed like forever, the bathroom looked like a battlefield: it was liberally splattered with mud, the bath was full of silt, the floor was swimming with half an inch of water, Sam was soaking wet, that particular bath mat and one of the washcloths would never play the piano again, but Dean and Bobby were scrubbed pink and clean and wrapped in towels and glaring daggers at him.

"There," he smiled a brittle smile at them, "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

"He's mean," Bobby confided to Dean.

"He's a bitch," Dean agreed.

"Now, why don't you two go and get dressed in some clean clothes," he said brightly, his eye beginning to twitch again, "And I'll clean up here."

"I'm not sure about the Bigfoot thing," he heard Bobby say as they made their way up the hall, "But he's definitely an evil genius."

He ordered a pizza for dinner, because he didn't think he could face another epic battle without strangling one of them. This apparently made up a lot of ground, because they cheered and told him he was awesome. He wondered what that website would think if he suggest 'bribery with offer of pizza' as a good way to get a reluctant child to bathe.

He put them to bed in the Winchesters' room that night, hoping they'd tired themselves out and would leave him to get some research (and some laundry) done. It seemed to work; he could even concede that they actually looked kind of cute while they were asleep.

He tried to get some more work done, but found himself yawning and his eyes crossing; two kids were hard work. He gave up, and got ready for bed.

He had to admit to himself, this was a lot harder that he'd thought is should be. He'd only had them for less than a full day, and he was exhausted. He couldn't research, and keep tabs on the boys. He really needed help, with trying to undo the spell, as well as keeping Dean and Bobby out of mischief.

With a tired sigh, he knelt by the bed, put his hands together, and closed his eyes.

Now I lay me down, worn out,  
>Because they yell, and run, and shout,<br>To Castiel I pray, I plead  
>For aid now in my time of need.<p>

An evil witch, an evil book,  
>But Dean just had to take a look,<br>A bookmark with a naked lady  
>Caught his eye, and I'm afraid he<p>

Set off an occult land mine,  
>With Bobby in the firing line<br>Of what the witch did to her prey:  
>It sucked the years of life away,<p>

So Bobby's now aged seven years,  
>But still knows Latin, it appears,<br>Because he read some from the spell,  
>So Dean is now a kid, as well.<p>

If I leave them for just a minute  
>They find trouble and get in it.<br>When they had to take a bath  
>You should've seen the aftermath,<p>

They run, they shout, they yell, they swear,  
>They try to pull out my leg hair,<br>I think that I will go insane  
>If they should do it all again,<p>

So, Castiel, if you have time  
>To spare and you can help me, I'm<br>In hope that you may visit when  
>You can. Before I snap. Amen.<p>

And if I die while trying to snooze,  
>Don't let them run off with my shoes."<p>

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><p>Reviews are the squirming, soapy, nekkid Winchesters in the Bath Of Life!<p> 


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

_Sam shivered; he had been nice and warm, wrapped in a thick, comfy hoodie, and the sun was shining, and the air was warm. He'd been walking on springy green grass, then out of nowhere two cute little bunny rabbits appeared, noses twitching adorably. They'd gnawed on the laces, then hopped off with his shoes__ and socks. Well, that's inconvenient, he thought..._

_The ground he was walking across was suddenly covered with icy dew, and his feet were cold. And... ticklish._

_When he looked down again, a swarm of little blue mice were scampering around his feet, dashing over his toes, and their whiskers were tickling him._

"_Ooooh! OoooOOOoooh! Hey! That tickles!" he complained. The mice didn't pay any attention to him, they just kept scampering, and giggling, and running around his feet. They were kind of cute, he thought, except for the fact they were tickling his feet, which was kind of weird, and he thought he really should go find the rabbits that stole his footwear._

_First of all, however, he had to deal with the tiny little ginger kitten that was pushing an old style push mower up his shin; he could hear the blades go 'snick snick snick', and he didn't want to hurt the little guy, but his shins really didn't need mowing..._

"Grzfl?" mumbled Sam, blearily opening his eyes. "Whazzthmmm?" Blinking a few times, he looked at the end of his bed.

The covers at the end of the bed had been pulled back. Dean was holding a piece of paper to the bottom of one of his feet, and meticulously tracing around it. Bobby was carefully snipping hair from the shin of his other leg.

"Hmmmm?" Sam's brain sought to catch up with his eyes. "Sgoinon?" He yawned and tried to wake up a bit more. "What're you doing, guys?" he asked, managing to form an actual sentence at last.

"Research," Dean answered, apparently satisfied with his outline.

"Good morning, Uncle Sammy!" Bobby told him brightly, folding a piece of paper. "Can we have breakfast soon?"

"Yeah, sure guys," Sam mumbled, pulling his chilly feet up under the rest of the covers. "Uh, I'll, um, see you down there. Go get dressed."

He sat up, and inspected the small bald patch on one shin, shaking his head in bemusement. At least they hadn't decided to get a pair of pliers, and yank out a handful at a time.

Downstairs, he perused the kitchen cupboards and refrigerator. The cupboard was getting bare, he noticed; he'd have to do a supply run sometime today, which would involve taking the Gruesome Twosome out in public. His stomach did a barrel roll at the very thought.

"Okay, then, who wants pancakes?" he forced himself to sound cheerful, finding a packet of mix. Pancakes would be all right for them, pancakes contained dairy, and protein, and he could probably hide some fruit in there if he rolled them up...

"Yaaaay!" went his own personal fan club. He filed that bit of information away: pancakes = improved ratings in the polls, oatmeal and poached eggs = disastrous swing away from the incumbent.

After breakfast, during which he said that if they ate the apple and banana he'd sliced up with the pancakes, they could pick as many fleas as they liked off each other – this also was a very popular policy with his constituents – he spoke to them in a tone that he hoped was a suitable combination of Mary Poppins and Atilla the Hun. "Now, I have some more work to do today," he told them, "And I want you two play sensibly. Do not set anything on fire. If you make a mess, you have to clean it up. If you break something, you have to help fix it up. And if you get dirty, you have to have a bath. Those are the rules."

"What if we get a little bit dirty?" asked Bobby.

"Then you will only need to be in the bath for a little while," Sam told him.

"What if we only get our clothes dirty, you know, only dirty on the outside of our clothes?" Dean wanted to know.

"Then you only have to get washed on the outside of your skin," Sam answered with a smile, watching Dean's seven-year-old brain try to work out what the hell that meant. "So, try to keep the noise down to a dull roar, okay?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they chorused, heading outside, slamming the door behind them.

"So, what's the next step in our Bigfoot research?" asked Bobby.

"Well, we have to find something to poke him with, to see if he makes the Bigfoot noise," Dean told him.

"What about a stick?" suggested Bobby.

"Sticks break too easily," mused Dean, "We might need something a bit stronger. Something that won't snap off."

"How do we get him to hold still?" Bobby worried. "He might not like being poked. I don't reckon I'd like being poked."

Dean looked thoughtful. "We'll have to see if we can think of a way to make him hold still," he agreed. "Let's have a look in the sheds."

There was all manner of strange and wonderful junk in the sheds at Singer Salvage, everything from pieces of seized engines to ragged toys (which they took note of, in case the opportunity to resume Aztec sacrificial rituals arose). They did manage to find a few potential pokers, including an old windscreen wiper, a bicycle mudguard and a doll's arm (possibly from the doll Bobby and adult Dean had sacrificed previously). They tested out their pokers on each other, and finally decided on the wiper and a fly swatter. They were in earnest discussion about how to get a potential Bigfoot to hold still in order to do some experimental poking, when something caught Dean's eye.

"What's this?" he asked, poking at a pile of junk to get at the paper sticking out from behind a work bench.

"Is it a comic?" asked Bobby, "It looks to be the right size for a comic."

They used an old tennis racquet frame to prod and swipe at the paper, until it came loose.

It had lost its cover, so they didn't know what it was called. It wasn't a comic, although it was a sort of magazine. However, it was a magazine of a type that neither of them had ever seen before. They took it outside for a better look.

"There's lots of pictures," commented Dean, flipping through the pages.

"It's just pictures of ladies," Bobby pointed out, disappointed, "It's just pictures of Chinese ladies... oh." He looked confused. "Where's her shirt? Why has she taken her shirt off? Wouldn't she get cold, walkin' around with no shirt on?"

"Maybe she's going to have a bath?" suggested Dean, turning the page. "Oh."

Bobby looked even more confused. "She can't do that!" he declared emphatically, "She can't go out like that! People will stare. And she'll get arrested."

"Yeah?" queried Dean, studying the picture.

"Yeah," confirmed Bobby, "Like Mrs Phillips. She had an argument with Mr Phillips, and she took her shirt off, and her vest, and we all saw her boobies, and the police came and arrested her."

"Well, this lady is inside somewhere," Dean pointed out, turning the page. "Oh, wow, that's... wow."

"Why would anybody want a whole magazine full of pictures of ladies without their clothes on?" wondered Bobby in bewilderment.

"Well, she's kind of pretty," suggested Dean, "And she looks, you know, kind of nice. All soft, and round. Pretty." He turned another page. Both of them stared.

"She's kinda, um... is that normal?" asked Bobby dubiously. "I mean, that's, well, kind of... hairy..."

Dean eyed the picture critically.

"Well, girls and boys are _different_, of course," he said knowingly.

"I know that!" Bobby told him loftily, "It's where babies come out of their Mommy's tummy. But, are they supposed to be, you know, hairy?"

"I don't know. The rest of her doesn't look weird, though... babies come out?" asked Dean.

"Sure," Bobby said airily, "Just like cows and pigs. I've watched them have their babies. Ladies is pretty much like that, I guess. When Ma had my brother, she sure bellowed like the house cow did. Louder, even. Sounded like it hurt."

Dean was intrigued – he'd seen pregnant women, but never thought about the details much. "How does it get in there to start with?" he asked.

"I dunno exactly," Bobby said in a hushed tone, "But I asked Father Flaherty about it once, and he said you can't find out until you get married, or you go to Hell."

Dean looked thoughtful. "We could ask Uncle Sammy," he suggested, "About the magazine, I mean. We better not ask about babies if you go to Hell for it."

"He is an evil genius," nodded Bobby, "So he'd probably know... hey!" a sudden inspiration struck, "You don't think she's..." he looked at the picture of the smiling Chinese lady with no clothes on. "You don't think... could she be a Bigfoot? Is that why she's hairy?"

Dean peered at the picture. "Her feet don't look that big," he noted doubtfully, "And the rest of her doesn't look very hairy. See her legs? Not hairy at all."

"Yeah, but, girls is different to boys, right?" Bobby reminded him, warming to his theory, "What if, what if it's like that for Bigfoots? Like girl dogs are usually smaller than boy dogs? Girl pigs are smaller than boy pigs? And girl cows are waaaaay smaller than the bull. And women don't grow whiskers? Well, except for my Auntie Mae, anyway. Maybe, maybe it's like that with Bigfoots. Maybe the boy ones get bigger and hairier than the girl ones, but the girl ones are still a bit hairy, because they are after all Bigfoots!" He beamed.

Dean stared at him, marvelling at Bobby's theory of sexual dimorphism in Bigfoots. "That's amazing!" he commented, "That's gotta be it."

"Maybe Uncle Sammy is the one who hid that out here," Bobby said, "Maybe he didn't want it in the house, in case anyone found it, and worked out he has pictures of Bigfoot ladies!" He frowned at a hole in his own logic. "Dunno why they don't have their clothes on, though."

"We better hide it again, so he doesn't get suspicious," said Dean, shoving the tattered magazine back behind the work bench. The movement dislodged another pile of junk, which went sliding to the floor.

"Balls," muttered Bobby, kicking at the heap, "We'd better pick this up." He picked up what looked like an old tool box, and a tangle of rope came with it. He pulled at the rope. "Hey, give me a hand here," he smiled, "I think I have an idea."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam heard the door open and shut, and the hushed voices as Dean and Bobby came back into the house. He might've been suspicious about their quietness if he hadn't been nose-deep in one of the reference books.

He found them in the kitchen, carefully pouring themselves glasses of milk. "So, what have you two been up to?" he asked.

Two pairs of guileless eyes turned on him, and smiled happy, well-behaved smiles. "We've been looking at... trees," Bobby told him.

Dean nodded vigorously in agreement. "Trees," he echoed. "They're... cool."

"Yeah?" asked Sam, pleased that they'd found something quiet, potentially educational, and not terribly messy to do. "What do you like about trees?"

"They're very... treeish," opined Bobby.

"And they're all different," added Dean.

"And some are big, and some aren't," said Bobby.

"The leaves are all different," said Dean.

"And, and, and, some of them have... twigs," said Bobby.

"And birds, and... stuff. And they do this in the wind." Dean raised his arms and swayed in a very treelike fashion. Bobby hurriedly joined in.

"Well, you two make wonderful trees," smiled Sam, "Maybe you could draw some pictures of trees?" They both smiled brightly, as if the idea of drawing trees was the most fun any seven year old could have.

"That's a great idea!" enthused Dean. "Let's go draw some trees, Bobby!"

"Yay for trees!" piped Bobby. They took their milk, and headed for the living room. Sam smiled again, took his coffee, and went back to the study. This morning's talk had clearly done the trick. Maybe this whole child-care gig wasn't so hard, after all...

He'd been back at the books for about fifteen minutes, when he heard a shuffling noise outside the door of the study.

"Guys?" he asked, without looking up, "Do you want something?"

By way of answer, Bobby and Dean came charging into the room at full tilt, uttering a loud war cry, and threw the cargo net they'd found in the shed over him.

"What the hell?" spluttered Sam, flapping at the net, which only seemed to make it tangle up around him.

"We got him!' shouted Dean, "We got him! Poke him, Bobby!"

"What? OW!" went Sam, as Bobby stepped in and briskly poked him with what looked like an old car windscreen wiper. "Hey, what the hell do you think OW!"

"Sounds suspicious to me," muttered Bobby, as Dean regarded Sam critically, and aimed his fly swatter.

"OW!" yelped Sam, pawing at the net, "Hey! You knock it off right now! Stop it this OW! OW!"

He struggled with the net, looking for an edge, as Bobby and Dean took turns..._ poking_ him. Their expressions weren't mischievous, he noted, in between trying to swat them away, and trying to disentangle himself, but more thoughtful, analytical. Once he was out of the tangle of netting, he thought, maybe he should be worried about that.

"That's enough!" he snapped, "I don't know what you think you're OW! STOP IT! OW!"

The poking attack ceased as quickly as it had started. The two boys looked at each other wordlessly, and left the room.

Bewildered, Sam finally untangled himself, and flung the net aside, spluttering in a combination of annoyance and disbelief. One minute they were pretending to be trees, the next they were pretending to be... big game hunters? He should probably be grateful they didn't try to play taxidermists with their 'prey' afterwards.

Through the kitchen window, he saw that they had started playing frisbee with what looked like the Hubcap Of Religious Correctness. Well, at least they were outside, and not too noisy. He refilled his coffee, sipping at it thoughtfully. He wondered if this was some sort of cosmic comeuppance for being a difficult child himself.

On the way back to the study, he nearly snorted coffee out his nose when he saw the drawings the boys had been doing. One was a picture of two cows doing something that Dean would no doubt describe as a bovine beautiful natural act, and one was a startlingly evocative depiction of a naked lady. She was coloured in yellow. He sighed. If they asked him anything at all pertaining to... That Sort Of Thing, he resolved to make them sit down and watch the Life On Earth series; tonight's episode was on water birds, and he would point out the stork.

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><p>Reviews are the Squirming Netted Winchester Of Your Choice in the Study Of Life! (clothing optional).<p> 


	9. Chapter 9

Jimiverse Quote of the Day comes from Katiki: 'They said they were looking at trees, when really they were looking at bushes.' *tish-BOOM!*

Ahem. Any fluffy schmoop (or schmoopy fluff) is aeicha's fault, because she wanted it.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 9<strong>

Another burst of cheering and barking made its way to the study. Sam realised he'd just read the same line three times. They were driving him nuts; he found himself starting to worry every time the silence between cheers was too long.

He told himself to stop worrying. He'd taken the Hubcap of Religious Correctness away, and had insisted that they find an actual frisbee, not wanting them to be throwing a piece of metal at each other at high speed, and it was keeping them occupied. Frisbee was, after all, harmless, wasn't it? How much trouble could you get into playing frisbee? It would wear them out. It didn't involve matches, or nets, or mud, or simulated human sacrifice. He turned back to the book, determined to make progress.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Frisbee!" yelled Dean, flipping the disc at Bobby, who caught it.

"Back at ya!" shouted Bobby, throwing it back to Dean, while Jimi barked happily and chased after it.

"Catch it, Jimi!' Dean encouraged the dog, waggling the frisbee at him, "Catch it! Aaaaaaand... fetch!" He threw the frisbee high. Jimi raced after it, and leaped to snatch it out of the air.

"He's real good at that," remarked Bobby, as the dog trotted back with the disc, and whuffed for it to be thrown again. Dean obliged, and Jimi pulled off another astonishing leap. "He could be one of them trick dogs in the movies."

Jimi brought the frisbee back once more, eyes dancing, and Dean threw it hard and high. Unfortunately, the wind got underneath it, and took it into the branches of a large tree.

"Balls," muttered Bobby. "Our frisbee's stuck."

Dean eyed the tree thoughtfully. "I think I can probably get it down, if I climb up there," he mused.

"Should we call Uncle Sammy?" asked Bobby in an anxious tone. "It looks quite a ways up."

"Uncle Sammy's busy. He's doing something real important, so we shouldn't pester him," Dean told him, "Here, give me a boost."

Reluctantly, Bobby did his best to help the smaller boy get to the lowest branch of the tree. Dean scrambled from one branch to the next, carefully making his way up the trunk, until he made it to the branch where the frisbee was trapped.

"That's it!" yelled Bobby, "Wiggle that one!"

Dean clung to the trunk, and bounced up and down on the branch. The frisbee dislodged, and fell a few feet down the tree.

"It's working!" Bobby called to him, "It fell down to a lower branch!"

"I got it!" Dean told him, making his way down again, to wiggle the next branch. The frisbee dropped again.

"One more ought to do it!" instructed Bobby, so Dean obliged, climbing down, and bouncing...

First came the tearing sound of green wood giving way.

Next came the swish of foliage and the dull thump.

And, finally: The Howling.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam was on his feet the second he heard the wailing howl – or was it a howling wail? – start.

Dean was sprawled at the foot of a tree, clutching his arm, and bawling at the top of his voice. Bobby sat beside him, face white, bottom lip wobbling.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" went Dean.

"He fell out of the tree, Uncle Sammy," said Bobby anxiously, his voice trembling, "He fell out of the treeeeeeeeeee..."

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" went Dean.

"Okay, Dean, I'm here," Sam reassured him, having satisfied himself that Dean wasn't badly hurt. "Let me have a look at your arm."

"IT HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURTS!" howled Dean, tears running down his freckled face.

"He fell out of the treeeeeeeee," repeated Bobby, sobbing along out of fright.

Not to be left out of the general ambiance, Jimi threw back his head and howled in confused anguish.

"It's not broken," Sam told Dean, "But you got a real good dose of gravel rash, here..."

"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW!" yowled Dean.

"_He fell out of the treeeeeeeeee!_" shrieked Bobby.

"...So I think we'd better get you inside and get you cleaned up, okay?" Sam went on.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Dean grabbed Sam around the neck and clung on like a distressed limpet. "IT HUUUUUUUUUURTS!"

"Yeah, I bet it does," Sam grinned to himself. Experience told him that the louder and more persistently Dean whined, the less he had to worry about, and he was guessing the same thing was operating here. "Come on, let's all go inside, and get you fixed up."

He made his way back to the house with Dean held in one arm, and Bobby clinging to the other, while Jimi stayed close. All three of them howled relentlessly. Once they were indoors the noise, which had been raucous outside, became a deafening cacophony.

It was, in a way, extremely impressive: two small crying children and one howling dog were giving the anguished lamentations of the Damned in the lower circles of Hell a run for their money. How did they do it, marvelled part of his brain: they were crying without stopping to breathe in, it was just a continuous, unbroken noise – he wondered if children had some natural capacity for circular breathing. Did kids have a more natural aptitude for such wind instruments as the flute or didgeridoo at a young age? Did they lose the ability as they grew up, and presumably howled less? Had medical science done any research into the area of children's lung function and woodwind breath control as relating to sustainability of wailing? There would have to be some sort of quantitation used to document it, taking into account pitch, volume, duration of howl, number of adult eardrums permanently damaged, maximum distance at which other children started to cry too out of fright...

He sat Dean on the kitchen table, and fetched the accoutrements of first aid.

"I need your help here, Bobby," he said seriously, handing the boy the bag of cotton balls, "Can you hold this for me?" Bobby nodded shakily, and hiccupped into silence, clutching the bag.

Dean subsided into snotty, stuttering keening as Sam cleaned the dirt from the scrape on the kid's arm. "I got an owieeeeeeeeeeeeeeee," he moaned.

"Yeah, I can see that," Sam sympathised, "But it's all cleaned out now. I'll put some gauze on it, and that will make it all better, okay?" Dean nodded unhappily as Sam bandaged his arm, and finally fastened it with a Peanuts band-aid he found wedged in the bottom of the box.

"There you go, all better," he announced. Dean didn't look convinced. He examined the dressing on his arm, then held it out.

"Kiss it better?" he asked hopefully, large green eyes shining up at Sam.

Sam struggled to keep a straight face. "You think that will help?" he asked. Dean nodded, so Sam took the proffered arm and planted a gentle peck on the gauze. "There. How does that feel?"

Dean smiled a wobbly little smile. "Okay," he conceded.

After a trip to the bathroom to wipe Dean's face, during which Dean insisted on being carried – Sam was horrified at just how, well, _sticky _the kid got when he leaked – they seemed considerably subdued. They followed him into the study, where Dean wanted to sit in his lap, and Bobby crawled up onto the other leg.

"Uh, it's kinda crowded in here, guys," he said tentatively, "And I do have some reading to do, so why don't you go into the living room, and draw somERRRK!"

Two sets of small arms tightened anxiously around his neck, making him think briefly of the scene in 'Alien' when they tried to cut the facehugger off John Hurt.

"Okaaaay, or, maybe you can just sit here with me for a while," he conceded, once he could breathe again.

What are you doing here, Uncle Sammy?" asked Bobby, pointing to the witch's book.

"Well, like I told you, I'm trying to help some friends with a problem," he answered carefully, "And I think that some things in these books might help me fix it, if I can find the right information."

"That bit's in Latin," Bobby noted, "I recognise it. From lessons with Father Flaherty. It says..."

"NO!" barked Sam, regretting it instantly when both boys jumped, and started to strangle him again. "I mean, these are... special books, in here," he went on, "And it's very important that you never, ever read out loud from special books."

"Why?" asked Dean.

"Well, uh, that can cause... stuff," Sam improvised desperately.

"What kind of stuff?" pressed Bobby.

_What the hell,_ thought Sam,_ they're only seven years old... _"Well," he intoned portentously, "These are magic books. They have magic in them."

Two pairs of eyes widened. "Really? You mean, like, spells, and stuff?" asked Bobby, awestruck.

"Uh-huh," Sam told him, "And some of it is really nasty, bad magic."

"Like what witches do?" Dean prompted.

"Exactly," Sam nodded, "These friends of mine have a problem with a nasty witch, who put a really nasty spell on them, and I'm trying to find a way to undo her horrible magic."

"Wow," breathed Dean, "What did she do?"

"Well," Sam looked serious, "You have to keep this secret, okay? And not tell anybody. Because most people don't know about magic and witches, so you have to keep it extra specially top secret if I tell you. Understand?"

Two small boys nodded soberly, their eyes wide. "We promise," Bobby told him.

"Pinky swear," added Dean, waggling the appropriate digit.

"Okay, then. Well, this witch, she made a really bad spell, and put it in this book here," he indicated the grimoire in front of him, "And when they opened it, it turned two grown ups into little boys."

Bobby and Dean gasped in horror. In the manner of seven-year-olds, they imagined that life as adults would be an existence of unparalleled freedom, to do whatever you liked, stay up as late as you wanted, drive a car, not go to school any more, eat as much candy as you could fit in without having an adult tell you to stop, and go without bathing for a fortnight if that's what you felt like The idea of attaining that blessed state of self-determination, then having it snatched away again, was appalling beyond description.

"That was really mean," commented Bobby. "She was a really mean witch."

"Yeah, she was," Sam agreed, "So, that's why I need you guys to be quiet, so I can think in here, and figure this out. And," he pushed the book away from Dean's wandering curious touch, "That's why you never, ever, touch or read these books, because they can hurt you. Or somebody else."

"How come you can read them, then?" asked Bobby. "You haven't been turned into a little boy."

Dean rolled his eyes. "That's because he's Super-Geek, the evil genius, duh," he told Bobby. Understanding dawned on Bobby's face.

"Where did you learn this stuff?" Bobby asked, peering with interest at other books around the room.

Sam smiled. "Here and there, but a lot of it I learned from my big brother, and a special uncle."

"They must be really smart," Dean noted, poking at some of Sam's notes. "Could you teach us some stuff?"

"Er, I'm not sure that would be a good idea," began Sam.

"Please?" wheedled the boys in stereo. "Please? Pleeeeeeeease?"

Sam considered his options. If he said 'no', there was every chance that two curious boys would attempt to improvise, and look where that had gotten them so far...

"Okay," he agreed, "I'll teach you an important drawing you can learn to do, and you can practise it, because it doesn't work unless you get it absolutely perfect." They nodded solemnly, and followed him to the living room.

He took a clear piece of paper, and started to draw. "Now, this is called a Devil's Trap," he told them as he worked.

"What does it do?" asked Bobby.

"It traps demons," Sam told him, "If a demon walks over or under one of these pictures, it gets stuck, and can't do anything."

"What do you do once it's stuck?" Dean wanted to know.

"Well, they don't like salt, or holy water," Sam said, "And you can say a special sort of prayer to send 'em back to Hell."

Bobby studied the drawing critically, and picked up a pencil. "How big does it have to be?" he asked, making a start on the pentagram.

"Big enough for the demon to stand on, usually," Sam told him, "So, can you guys keep yourselves busy with this for a little while?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they chorused seriously.

Sam went to make himself some more coffee, noting again just how empty the kitchen had become. They'd have to do a supply run before lunch. Well, he could get in a bit more work before then...

Dean and Bobby practised drawing traps. "It's harder than it looks," conceded Dean, tongue set in the corner of his mouth in concentration. "I wonder how it works."

"It must be these squiggles around the outside," proposed Bobby, sighing as he messed up a squiggle. "They must mean something to demons, like particularly demonic things, so they get stuck."

"Yeah," mused Dean, attempting his own squiggle. "I wonder if there are other sorts of traps?"

"Dunno," shrugged Bobby, "We could ask Uncle Sammy. Once we get this one right."

"Maybe if you change the stuff around the outside?" mused Dean. "That could be cool. You could draw a teacher trap, or a squirrel trap..."

"Or an idjit trap," added Bobby, "Or a girl trap. If you had a secret hideout, or something."

"Yeah, totally." Dean frowned thoughtfully, then grinned. He pulled another piece of paper towards himself, and started again, but he wasn't following the picture Sam had drawn for them to copy.

"Hey, what's that?" asked Bobby curiously. "That's not the right squiggle for there! It looks more like a shoe! You won't catch any demons with that!"

"Nope, it won't catch demons," smiled Dean. "But we don't really want to catch demons. What we should be trying to draw is, a Bigfoot trap!"

* * *

><p>Cas will show up eventually - Sam's p-mail has to make it past Denael in Reception, be transcribed, and find its way to the IN box on Cas's desk.<p> 


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

On the one hand, Sam really wasn't keen on going shopping with two small, energetic, curious and impulsive boys in tow. On the other hand, part of him was saying that it couldn't be that much worse than going shopping with adult Dean in tow. On the other other hand, the idea of leaving them at the yard to their own devices was out of the question. But, since both boys seemed to have quietened considerably since their fright with the tree, Sam decided it might be an opportune time to head out.

He made his way into the living room, where Bobby and Dean were in intense, hushed discussion over a drawing. He glanced at it, and had to laugh to himself; like a game of Chinese Whispers on paper, their 'devil's' trap had evolved into a pentagram surrounded by symbols that appeared to represent a boot, a book, a fly swatter, a bath tub, and... yep, a naked woman. He was amused to wonder what sort of demon would get caught in a trap like that.

"Okay, guys, we gotta do a supply run, if we want to eat," he announced, "So, that means a trip into town."

That had their attention. "Can we get ice cream?" Dean wanted to know.

"Can we get candy?" asked Bobby.

"Can we get pie?" queried Dean.

"Can we get jerky?" pleaded Bobby.

"We'll see," intoned Sam, "Maybe if you're good, we can get a treat to bring home."

"Yaaaay!" they chorused.

"Okay, you guys go and get your jackets," instructed Sam, heading for the kitchen.

It was with some disappointment that they watched him leave the living room. Dean picked up the corner of the rug, and Bobby picked up the sheet of paper that had been underneath it.

"Well, that one didn't work," Bobby humphed, "He walked straight over it!"

"We just haven't drawn it properly yet," Dean assured him, "We can try it again when we get back. We just gotta keep trying different things, until we get it right."

They put their latest version of the Bigfoot trap under the rug, and headed upstairs.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It wasn't a long way from Singer Salvage to Sioux Falls proper, but by the time Dean and Bobby had squabbled about who would ride up front with Uncle Sammy (Sam gave that privilege to Jimi, in order to shut down the argument) then bickered about who got to sit on the driver's side in the back (Sam designated Bobby, telling Dean he could sit on that side on the way back) then had a shoving match over where the exact centre of the back seat was, it felt like a 100 mile trip.

He eased the Impala off the road and into the gas station first – that was the last thing he needed, he thought glumly as he looked at the gauge, to run out of gas with two overactive boys (and a dog who was far too willing to join in their games) in tow.

"Okay, I just gotta fill the car, then we can HEY!" before he could tell them to stay put, both doors opened, and they scrambled out. "Dean! Bobby!" he called, "Get back here, you can't run around a gas station, it's dangerous!"

Ignoring him, they started to whizz around on a signage pole, complete with aeroplane noises. "Guys," he called sternly, "Back here."

They left of their aeroplane whizzing and scuttled to the pumps.

"What's this for?" asked Dean, pulling a squeegee wiper out of a bucket.

"For sword fights!" answered Bobby, grabbing another one, and waving it.

"Boys, you put those back, right now!" instructed Sam, keeping one eye on the pump. Paying no attention at all, they began to fence with the squeegees, chasing one another around the car.

"Hey! Enough!" Sam barked at them, making what he hoped was an apologetic face at a couple of other customers, who were watching the proceedings with interest. "Dean, put that back! Bobby, give me that! They're not toys!" He plucked the wiper from Bobby's hand, and glared at Dean until he returned his. "Now you two stand right here, and don't move!" he told them. Two baleful pairs of thwarted eyes looked up at him accusingly.

He figured he might as well as clean the windscreen while the tank filled, since it was pretty dirty, so he took the bucket and wiper and got to work. The two boys were satisfyingly silent, apparently having taken him seriously this time. Finally.

He finished up the driver's side window and mirror, and dropped the squeegee back into the bucket. "Okay," he turned to put it back, "Let's just go in and pay, and..."

Bobby was wrapping Dean in the paper hand towel. "Look, Uncle Sammy, Dean's a mummy!" he offered by way of explanation.

"Oooooo-aaaaaaaargh-oooooooooo-aaaaaaargh," rasped Dean, lurching towards Sam with paper-wrapped arms outstretched. Sam was pretty sure he heard somebody snicker.

"Knock it off!" he growled, grabbing hold of Dean and tearing off his wrappings, "Behave yourselves."

They followed him obediently into the station, where they were immediately distracted by a towering rack of sunglasses on display.

"Look at me! Look at me!" yelled Bobby, donning a pair in a particularly lurid shade of green, "I'm Roy Orbison!"

"You look like Elton John in those. I'm Slash!" declared Dean, selecting a pair that was so big they would barely stay on his nose.

"Put those back!" ordered Sam, throwing an apologetic smile at the cashier, a woman who looked to be about 130 years old. From the expression she shot back at him, she also apparently was as amused as a Southern Baptist minister at a gay pride rally. Unfortunately, both air guitarists were busy playing extremely complicated licks, and paid him no attention.

"Doo, do do do do do do do doo, dee dee dee doo," went Bobby.

"Blah-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah! Ningity ningity ningity ningity wah-wah-wahahahaha!" went Dean, right arm windmilling furiously.

"Fuck my life," muttered Sam. "I said, put those back! I mean it! Dean, be carefu-"

With a depressingly inevitable crash, Dean's manic strumming made contact with the stand. It fell over, sending sunglasses cascading over the two boys.

Dean froze in place, eyes wide, like a rabbit caught in a spotlight. Bobby burst into tears.

"I'm really, really sorry about this," Sam told the cashier, dropping to his knees, to gather up fallen sunglasses and check the howling child. "Are you okay, Bobby?"

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" went the distraught child.

"This aint a playground, mister," the elderly cashier scowled, giving Sam and the boys a glare that would've melted a glacier fast enough to send climate change sceptics running to join Greenpeace.

"I understand that, ma'am, and I'm really sorry," Sam reiterated, "They're just a bit of a handful. It's okay, Bobby, you just got a bit of a fright," he reassured the boy, patting him on the back. Bobby clung to him, sobbing, while Dean scampered around, picking up sunglasses. He scooped them up, and handed them to Sam.

"I'm sorry, Uncle Sammy," he said in a small contrite voice, green eyes brimming with unshed tears.

"Just check for any more under the shelves," Sam told him brusquely. Dean scuttled to obey. Sam righted the stand, and put the sunglasses back, while simultaneously trying to comfort Bobby, who eventually hiccupped into the odd hitching sniff.

"Now, why don't you go and apologise to the cashier lady for making such a ruckus," said Sam, herding them to the counter.

"We're sorry," chorused the Terrible Twosome; they gazed up at her with wistful, contrite puppy-dog eyes expressions, and Sam had to acknowledge that he was in the presence of a couple of masters. He wondered if her head would explode from the cute.

It didn't.

"People oughta have ta get a licence before they're allowed to breed," she told him pointedly.

Sam opened his mouth to deny paternity, then closed it again. "You know," he said, finally, "You're probably right."

He paid for the gas, and as he took his change, he notice that Dean had picked up something from the rack at the counter. "Dean, whatever it is, put it down..." he began.

To his horror, he realised that Dean was perusing one of the magazines wrapped in plastic. "Look Uncle Sammy!" he piped up eagerly, "It's a magazine like yours!"

Sam's jaw worked soundlessly. He could feel his face turning red.

"We found it in the shed," Bobby explained.

Dean held the magazine up so the cashier could see it. "Its pictures of ladies," he told her.

"Without their clothes on," added Bobby, his tone managing to convey the sort of disapproval usually only heard by octogenarians making pronouncements prefaced by the phrase 'In My Day...'.

"You can see their boobies," Dean informed her.

"And where the babies come out," sniffed Bobby reprovingly.

"They're pretty," Dean opined.

"It's rude," stated Bobby, crossing his arms firmly. "Ma found my oldest sister behind the hay shed with Danny Thornton, without her britches on, and tanned her hide. Ladies who don't wear their britches go to Hell. Ma says so."

The woman behind the counter stared at Sam. He wondered if she had any children. Probably not, he decided, she probably ate her young. Come to think of it, he was willing to bet that she ate her husband after mating.

"Yeeeeeep," he went, grabbing a child's hand in each of his, and fleeing.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"Is he okay?" Dean whispered to Bobby, eyeing Sam in the mirror. "His face has gone a funny colour. And one of his eyes is twitching."

"He was probably scared by that lady in the store, there," suggested Bobby, "She looked real mean. I bet she was a witch."

Dean's eyes went wide. "A witch?" he repeated. "You think?" He stared at Sam. "You don't think she put a spell on Uncle Sammy, do you?"

"I don't know," shrugged Bobby. He looked thoughtful, then leaned forward, and gave Sam a hearty poke. "Uncle Sammy!"

"Gyah!" Sam jumped, pulled from his horrified thoughts by the jab between the shoulders from behind him. "Ow! God! What was that for?"

"Was that lady a witch?" asked Bobby. "Did she put a spell on you?"

"What? No!" he yelped, sighing. "I'm just... oh, God, why me?"

He found a park blessedly close to the supermarket, and turned to glare at the boys.

"Right," he said unsmilingly, "I am going to go do us some shopping. I will not have another performance like the one you turned on at the gas station. You two are going to stay right here, in the car." He fished under the seat, and found a scuffed pack of cards for them. "You are going to amuse yourselves in a well-behaved, non-destructive, quiet fashion. And if you don't," he leaned over the seat, looming suddenly large and menacing, "If you don't, you will get nothing to eat but oatmeal and poached eggs for the rest of the week. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they gasped in horror. With a pointed glare, he headed off.

"So, what did you get?" asked Bobby, as soon as he was out of sight.

Dean grinned, and pulled large packs of Peanut M&Ms and Skittles from under his sweater. "If you'd kept crying for just a little bit longer, I reckon I could've got some jerky, too," he commented.

"Well, it had to look convincing," Bobby reminded him. "What will we play for?"

"M&Ms, to start," said Dean, counting out the candies. "You wanna deal?"

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

They amused themselves playing cards for candy, but with two seven-year-olds eating their profits as the game ebbed and flowed, they were soon out of currency.

"I'm still hungry," pouted Dean, shuffling at the cards dejectedly.

"We could go and buy ice cream," suggested Bobby, nodding to the parlour a couple of shops down from the car.

"We don't have any money," Dean pointed out glumly.

"Well, maybe we could get some," suggested Bobby thoughtful.

"How?" asked Dean, intrigued.

"Well, we raised some money for the church doing singing," Bobby told him, "You sing a song, and people walking past give you money."

"Yeah?" Dean paused. "Yeah, I've seen people doing that. They sing, or play guitars. We don't have any guitars. And I can't sing," he added gloomily, "Not good enough to get people to throw money. Can you sing?"

"A bit." Bobby took a breath, and began to sing in a high, clear soprano.

"_Jesu joy of Man's desiring,  
><em>_Holy wisdom, love most bright,  
><em>_Drawn by Thee, our souls aspiring  
>Soar to uncreated light...<em>"

Dean was agog. "Wow," he breathed, "That's amazing! That's real, grown up music!"

"I'm in the choir," Bobby told him ruefully. "Ma and Grandma make me go. I have to learn a part for the Miserere for next year." He shuddered at the thought. "Still," he brightened, "Pa says when I'm older and my balls drop, I'll be able to get out of it."

"What does that mean?" asked Dean, confused.

"I'm not sure," confided Bobby, "I think it's something to do with football; my brother left the choir when he was twelve, and started playing football instead. Maybe it's 'cause you drop the ball, when you're learning, and you're not very good yet."

"Hmmm." Dean considered that. "Do you know anything else?"

Bobby nodded. "I can do Pie Jesu Domine, and Salvator Mundi, and Ave Maria, although you gotta be careful with that one, that one can make old ladies cry." He looked at the ice cream parlour. "Do you think it would work?"

"Only one way to find out," Dean told him, opening the door.

"Uncle Sammy told us to stay in the car," Bobby reminded him, "I think he was kinda mad at us after the gas station."

"Well, we'll get some money, then we'll get some ice cream, then we'll come straight back to the car," Dean said, the very voice of reason, "We'll be in sight of the car the whole, entire time. That way, we're not _really_ doing anything wrong. Come on," he enthused, scanning the passing pedestrian traffic, "There's lots of old ladies out today."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam consulted his list, and sighed inwardly. The one time he really, really wanted to get his supply run done as fast as possible, events, people, no, the entire universe conspired against him.

The supermarket was in the throes of rearranging the entire stock, so everything was in different places. He was assailed by smiling ladies attempting to get him to sample small pieces of stuff on cocktail sticks, or mouthfuls of goo in tiny plastic cups. He was flagged down by old ladies asking him to retrieve items from the highest shelves. He was amazed at the number of elderly ladies out and about. What the hell? Was there a mass break out from a nursing home nearby, or something? And why did they keep picking him? There were other guys in the store who were tall enough to help – did he have a sign drawn on his back, 'Ask Me About My Fetching Things From High Shelves For You Service, Free For Pensioners!' perhaps, in a magic invisible marker that only females over the age of 65 could see?

There were only two check-outs open, despite the busyness of the store. Then, a computer glitch shut down the registers. There was a heart-stopping moment when his card in the name of Jimmy Page was initially declined, but finally, he was done, and headed back to the car.

Even then, an earnest man in a sombre suit attempted to delay him with a demanding cry of "You are in danger!"

"What?" Sam did a double take at the figure blocking his path.

"You are in danger!" the man repeated, waving a leather-bound book in his face, "We are all in danger! In danger of falling prey to Satan, and his lies!"

"Oh, him," huffed Sam, "Yeah, I've met him, he's a total dick. So's his brother. They both just need a nice hot cup of calm the fuck down, and a big slice of get over yourself. Excuse me." He pushed past, and went on his way.

He was further delayed by the crowd that was gathered on the sidewalk near the Impala. More little old ladies, he noticed, was there a plague of them or something? As he got closer, he heard the voice, a soaring, clear, boy treble.

_Ave Maria, Mater Dei,  
>Ora pro nobis peccatoribus,<br>Ora, ora pro nobis;  
>Ora, ora pro nobis peccatoribus...<em>

When he managed to get to the car and saw that it was empty, he rolled his eyes, and groaned to himself.

His height allowed him to see over the heads of the crowd, which included several sniffing old ladies. Bobby was singing, hands clasped demurely in front of him. Dean was wearing his most adorable 'beautiful child' expression, and holding Bobby's hat; he gave each person who dropped money into the hat a grateful smile, which was recognisably the ancestor of The Killer Smile. Jimi sat beside them, looking attentively noble, with a carefully lettered sign tucked under his collar reading THANK YOU.

Sam let Bobby finish the second verse, and waited for the applause to die away, then he cleared his throat and attracted the boys' attention.

"I thought I told you guys to stay in the car," he reminded them, as their audience drifted away.

"We stayed close to the car," Dean pointed out, "We were close enough to see it the whole time!"

"We wanted to make some money," explained Bobby, "So we could buy ice cream."

"For ourselves," Dean added, dialling up the adorableness, "So you wouldn't have to pay for it." Bobby nodded earnestly.

Sam found himself smiling. "Well," he said thoughtfully, "You didn't break anything, you didn't make any mess, and you couldn't exactly be called noisy for singing, so I guess that's all right."

"Yaaaay!" they cheered, "Can we get ice cream now?" asked Dean.

"We'll get one for you too, Uncle Sammy!" added Bobby.

"Okay, ice cream it is," he agreed, to more cheering. He herded them towards the ice cream parlour, where they spent their hard-earned cash on ice cream cones that looked far too large to fit into such small children.

It certainly kept them quiet on the way home, Sam noted. They weren't just quiet, they were subdued. He wondered if ice cream had some sort of soporific effect on kids – he didn't remember anything like that from his own childhood – or maybe they were just getting tired from what had already been an eventful day.

What Sam couldn't have known was that before his arrival back at the car, they'd already eaten a large packet of M&Ms, a large packet of Skittles, and make two previous trips to the ice cream parlour between bouts of busking, including hot dog involvement...

As they got out of the car, he was just wondering whether seven-year-olds were too old to take a nap, when he heard a small voice behind him.

"Uncle Sammy?" said Dean, a little faintly, "Uncle Sammy, I don't feel so good..."

Sam turned to see Dean looking mournful, and swaying a little. "Hey Dean," he said with concern, "What's wrong?" The kid did actually look a bit green, but he'd never been carsick that Sam remembered.

"I don't feel so good," he repeated.

"Me either," added Bobby, looking like he was going to cry again.

"Oh, that's no good," Sam said, hunkering down between them, "What is it? Do you feel sick?"

Both boys nodded miserably.

"Where do you feel sick, then?" he asked.

"In my stomach," replied Dean, pointing. Bobby nodded.

"I think maybe we should go inside, and you can have a lie-down," suggested Sam, pretty sure it was a case of over-excitement. "How sick do you feel?"

Dean demonstrated by puking copiously down Sam's shirt as well as his own.

Bobby turned out to be a sympathetic puker.

"Oh. Er. Ew," went Sam, gazing in disgust at the mess, complete with coloured sprinkles, now covering them all.

"My stomach hurts," sniffled Bobby.

"Me too," squeaked Dean, face wrinkling up as a prelude to unhappy sobbing.

"Right, then," sighed Sam, "Right, well, we'll um, just get you guys..."

_bloooooooork_

"Sorry," sniffed Dean, bottom lip wobbling, "I feel really icky."

"I feel icky too," moaned Bobby, breaking off to offload more ice cream.

"Oh, God," Sam closed his eyes for a moment, and wished he was anywhere else.

"I feeeeeeeel siiiiiiiiick," Dean wailed, wrapping his arms around Sam's neck and sobbing.

"I feel oogyyyyyyyyyy," howled Bobby, clutching at Sam's sleeve.

"Okay, then," Sam gritted his teeth, fighting the retching threatening to make his own throat close, and picked one boy up in each arm. "Well just get inside, and get cleaned up, and then..."

_bloooooooork_

"...Just as soon as you're done," he let Bobby wipe his face on his plaid shirt, figuring it couldn't get any worse, "We'll get you cleaned up, and maybe you need a lie down...:"

He headed for the porch, thinking it was probably best to try to undress them there, when Jimi suddenly started barking.

"Jimi, knock it off," he said with a sigh, "Right now, I really don't have time for..."

There was a flapping sound...

"Hello, Sam," announced Castiel, appearing directly in front of him.

For once, Sam did not complain about the angel's lack of understanding of personal space. "Cas!" he said brightly, "It's great to see you!" He thrust a moaning, puke-smeared child at Castiel. "Here, grab this, and come on in."

* * *

><p>This one's a bit long, but I wanted to have the whole shopping expedition in the one chapter.<p>

Reviews are the Winchesters Clinging To You For Comfort in the Great Big Sickroom Of Life! (puke is optional).


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

Castiel stared at the puke-smeared kid who had been thrust into his arms. "Hello, Dean," he said seriously.

"Who are you?" the boy asked, eyeing him curiously.

"This is a good friend of mine, Cas," explained Sam, trying to loosen the death-grip Bobby had around his neck just a bit.

"I am Castiel. I am an Angel of the Lord, a Warrior of Heaven," Castiel intoned.

Dean grabbed him around the neck, and wailed into his shoulder, "I feel siiiiiiick."

"That is not surprising," commented Castiel, staring at the kid, "Since you have eaten a large amount of chocolate-coated peanuts – at least a pound and a half – a great deal of coloured candy, three ice-cream cones… and a hotdog."

"What?" Sam's eyes bugged, partly from confusion, and possibly from lack of oxygen. "Chocolate coated peanuts?" He gazed in disbelief from Bobby, to Dean, and back again. "Like, M&Ms? Where did you get M&Ms from? And candy? Three ice-cream cones? That can't be right, there was definitely no hot dogs…"

_bloooooooooork_

"The evidence would suggest otherwise," noted Castiel, nodding at the mess Dean had left down his trench coat.

"Oh," said Sam faintly. "Um, look, let's just get cleaned up, and… yeah."

"It is remarkable," observed Castiel, as they made their way upstairs with the moaning, snuffling boys clinging to them, "Just how strongly such a small child may hold on to an adult when being carried and in need of reassurance."

"Eh, yeah," agreed Sam cautiously.

"I am quite certain that Dean's legs are in fact tight enough to leave bruising around my vessel's waist," the angel said.

"Okay," said Sam.

"His grip around my neck is compromising my vessel's ability to breathe," Castiel went on, "And I believe that he is also compressing some major blood vessels of the neck, which is contributing to a certain light-headedness, which was in turn initiated by the smell of regurgitated confectionery."

"Really?" asked Sam, in spite of himself.

"Indeed. It is something of a puzzle as to why vomitus should smell so repellent, considering the food was so recently consumed and is clearly barely digested."

"Er, it's not something I've ever wondered about, really," gulped Sam.

"The presence of bile acids and gastric no doubt contributes, but does not fully explain the phenomenon; revulsion at the expelled contents post emesis is universal among humans. It may well be a mechanism that has evolved to prevent re-ingestion of harmful or decomposing foodstuffs…"

"Cas!" barked Sam with a strangled yelp, "Can you please stop talking about throwing up before I join in?"

"My apologies," Castiel said, "I did not mean to induce a vago-vagal response from you."

Dean and Bobby barely grizzled as they were unceremoniously undressed, dunked in the bath, and bundled into clean clothes. Dean practically climbed Castiel's legs to get back into his arms, and Bobby clung to his waist as Sam changed his own soiled clothes. Attempting to put them to bed only resulted in more pitiful wailing, so they ended up installing them under a comforter on the sofa, one at each end.

"Now, you guys should rest and take a nap, I'm just going to be in the study with Cas," Sam began, evoking howls of protest.

"Nooooooo!" yowled Bobby, while Dean moaned and grabbed onto Castiel's tie.

"Er, okay then, tell you what, Cas will stay with you until you fall asleep, okay?" Sam said brightly.

Castiel cocked his head and looked confused. "Sam, I have no experience or expertise in caring for small children," he said, "I do not know what constitutes appropriate action in these circumstances. Perhaps I should accompany you, and examine the grimoire…"

"Caaaaaaas!" wailed Dean, gripping the angel's tie in one hand and his trench coat in the other, bottom lip trembling.

"You'll be fine, Cas," trilled Sam, sensing the possibility of escape, "Just, just, talk to them, maybe tell them a story, until they go to sleep."

"What story should I tell them?" asked the angel.

"Something gory for preference, they seem quite keen on anything that involves human dismemberment," Sam suggested, edging away.

"That may prove difficult," Castiel informed him, "As Dean's grip on my tie is making it difficult for my vessel to breathe, and while my Grace will prevent it from suffering from anoxia due to constriction of the trachea, it will make speaking impossible as breathing is necessary in order to vocalise…"

"It's okay, kids just get clingy when they're overtired, and feeling sick. You'll be fine, really, just call if you need anything, or they start throwing up again, or they try to set you on fire," Sam reassured him, as he made a final dash for the study. The word 'fled' would also describe his departure.

Castiel regarded the two Hunters, now reduced to seven-year-olds, on the sofa before him.

"I will stay with you while your… Uncle Sammy does some research," he intoned seriously. "It would be therapeutic for you to go to sleep now. Dean, you may now let go."

"I feel sick," Dean moaned again.

"That is because you consumed an intemperate quantity of highly sugared, fat-laden foodstuffs," Castiel told him, with a slight frown.

Bobby looked confused. "What did he say?" he asked Dean.

"I have no idea," admitted Dean.

Castiel cocked his head, and tried again. "That is because you stuffed yourself with junk food," he rephrased his answer, "And that is not good for you."

"We were hungry," muttered Bobby.

"Three ice cream cones is excessive, for anybody," Castiel intoned, "You may only be seven years old, but you are old enough to understand the concept of greed. Greed – and gluttony – are Capital Vices."

"What's a Capital Vice?" asked Dean.

"He means Deadly Sins," translated Bobby. "There's seven of 'em. Father Flaherty is dead against 'em. Especially lust."

"What's lust?" asked Dean.

"I'm not sure," Bobby replied thoughtfully, "But he glares at the same guys whenever he mentions it. I think it has something to do with loud cars."

"Hey, Cas, what's lust?" asked Dean, gazing trustingly up at the angel.

Castiel might have been, in Dean's words, as clueless as a nun at a Victoria's Secret store – or even as an angel in a brothel – but he sensed the metaphorical land mines suddenly strewn before him more acutely than any metaphorical metal detector. He considered the question carefully before replying.

"Bobby is right," he answered seriously, "Lust is a word that can describe a type of behavior undertaken by young men, in loud cars."

Bobby nodded sagely. "And he'd know," he commented, "If he's really an angel."

Dean studied Castiel carefully. "Are you really an angel?" he wanted to know.

"I am an Angel of the Lord, a Warrior of Heaven," Castiel reiterated. Neither of the boys looked completely convinced.

"The thing is, you don't really_ look_ like an angel," Bobby commented a bit apologetically, "You look more like the man from the bank. Or the men who sell insurance. Pa sets the dogs on them," he added with a note of satisfaction.

"This is not my true form," Castiel explained, "This is a human vessel. My true form is approximately the size of the Chrysler Building, and seeing it would burn your eyes out and make them melt in your skull."

Both boys looked at him with wide eyes. "Cool," breathed Dean.

"Where's your halo, then?" demanded Bobby. "The angels in the windows at church have haloes."

"Haloes are a human interpretation and depiction of holiness, employed in the iconography of many religions, including those predating Christianity," answered Castiel, "It was initially introduced into Christian imagery some time in the fourth century, intended to depict the logos, or divine aspect, of Jesus, although the Orthodox and Nestorian views differed as to whether it was manifest from birth, or acquired at baptism. When included in interpretations of the physical forms of angels, it has been used as a signifier, symbolizing the eternal heavenly purpose the the Host, with no beginning and no end; some descriptions of angels appearing to humans as descending within a vaporous whirlwind, which induces a ring or glowing cloud, or nimbus, another word for halo, has led to…"

He realized that both boys were staring at him dubiously again.

"I only wear it for very formal occasions," he told them, "It is like an uncomfortable hat, so I prefer not to wear it unless I have to."

"What about your harp?" pressed Dean, "Do you have a harp?"

Castiel considered explaining the imagery as being a human rendition derived from the association in scripture of angels with instruments and singing praises unto God, and artistic interpretation of the term 'choir' used to describe the Host in some translations.

"It is at the tuner's, being restrung," he told them. "It is a very complicated job, and is best left to an expert."

Bobby considered this. "It must wear out the strings, eventually, I guess," he conceded, "All that making a joyful noise unto God, and everything."

"So, you're wearing a human suit?" queried Dean, "Like, dressing up for Hallowe'en?"

"For the purposes of communicating safely with humans, yes," agreed Castiel.

"So, what's your job, then?" Dean went on, "As an angel?"

"He's a Warrior of Heaven, he said," recalled Bobby, "Which means he does smiting, and stuff."

Dean's face wrinkled in confusion. "What's smiting?" he asked.

"Smiting is what God and angels do when they get angry," Bobby told him, with the glee of a child describing something interestingly gory and messy, "It's a great big heavenly bitch-slap. It's like getting your ass whupped, but with lighting bolts, or explosions, or plagues, or storms. Angels use swords. Or flamethrowers," he added.

Dean gave Castiel an enquiring glance. "Can we see your flamethrower?" he asked.

"There are no flamethrowers, although some angels do bear flaming swords. I have a sword, but it is not flaming," Castiel explained, dropping his blade into his hand. Both boys went "Ooooooh," suitably impressed.

"Can we go outside and watch you smite something?" asked Bobby hopefully.

"Smiting is not something that is done for the purposes of amusement," Castiel told them sternly, "And you are both feeling unwell, and are supposed to be resting until you feel better. Napping is deemed to be beneficial for young children who have made themselves sick through overexcitement and overeating; you should both try to sleep."

"But I'm not tired!" insisted Dean, stifling a yawn.

"Then I will read you a story, as Sam suggested," Castiel announced, "It is a traditional activity undertaken to assist children in falling asleep."

"The books here are boring," complained Bobby. "Except the history one, with the Aztecs, and the gladiators, but I've looked at that one."

"I believe I may be able to locate a book with some stories you will enjoy," the angel assured the boys, looking around the room.

"What sort of stories?" asked Dean.

"Terribly violent ones," Castiel replied, "With battles, mass murder, violence, bodily mutilation, cannibalism, bursting intestines, desecration of corpses, human sacrifice, impaling, destruction of entire kingdoms, rivers of blood, torture, and unspeakable suffering."

"Yaaaay!" cheered both boys.

"But you must lie down and rest," he frowned sternly again. Dean and Bobby both snuggled dutifully under the comforter as Castiel perused the shelves.

"I didn't think Uncle Sammy had any books that interesting," commented Bobby.

"I believe I have found one right here," Castiel reassured him. He pulled a chair closer to the sofa, sat down, and opened the Old Testament. "We will start with the story of Joshua. 'Now the gates of Jericho were securely barred because of the Israelites. No one went out and no one came in'..."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam emerged from the study later in search of more coffee, and the lack of noise surprised him. He felt vaguely guilty for what had been basically throwing Castiel to the wolves – or the seven year olds – and running away, but dealing with Dean and Bobby as children was starting to get on his nerves. He stuck his head into the living room.

Bobby and Dean were fast asleep, with Jimi sprawled on the floor alongside the sofa. Castiel sat at one end of the sofa in a chair; Dean had a handful of his trench coat clutched to him like a security blankie. Sam was unable to help himself – he took out his phone, and took a picture, as Castiel read.

"…David took his men with him and went out and killed two hundred Philistines and brought back their foreskins. They counted out the full number to the king so that David might become the king's son-in-law. Then Saul gave him his daughter Michal in marriage..." he closed the book when he heard Sam's phone click.

"You've been reading them the Old Testament?" asked Sam incredulously.

"You suggested something gory," Castiel reminded him, "It seemed to be well received. They wanted to hear about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah twice."

"It's so quiet, with them asleep," commented Sam. "Maybe I should've got some children's formula antihistamine while I was shopping..."

They left the boys napping, and headed for the study, where Sam explained what had happened, and showed Castiel what his research had turned up so far.

"This is old magic," pronounced Castiel, frowning, "The witch in question was several hundred years old. This is not something I can undo. I cannot 'heal' them, as they are not, technically, actually unwell, or injured, they are just... young. I am sorry."

Sam sighed. "Well, I think I may be able to see a way to fix it," he told the angel, "It's just slow going, trying to keep an eye and an ear out for those two, and work out what to do. I can't concentrate for five minutes without worrying about what they're up to."

"I believe your strategy to devise a counter-spell is sound," Castiel told him, "And I may be able to assist you in acquisition of some of the more obscure ingredients." He paused, then added, "Perhaps I can be of extra assistance in supervising them while you continue your research."

Sam looked up hopefully. "Really?" he asked in a pleading voice. "Cas, that would be totally awesome. But... they're a real handful. They're mischief personified. With an unhealthy fascination for setting things on fire. Are you sure you're up to this?"

Castiel almost smiled. "Watching over children is within the purview of angels," he reminded Sam, "I am sure that I can keep them safe for a day or two." His face took on a look of determination. "I shall consult some authorities on child rearing while they are asleep. After all, I brought order out of chaos when Heaven itself was rent by civil war. By comparison, how difficult can two seven year olds be?"

Which just went to show, that angels are not omniscient, and if God was still lurking around somewhere, then He liked a giggle as much as anybody else.

* * *

><p>Reviews are the Winchester Of Your Choice Napping Adorably On The Sofa Of Life!<p> 


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Their nap had an amazingly, possibly even frighteningly, restorative effect on Bobby and Dean.

"Cas told us some really good stories!" enthused Dean over a late lunch of PB&Js, "Did you know, David got stoned off his ass!"

"And Samson killed a thousand guys with the assbone of a Jew!" contributed Bobby.

"And Jezebel was eaten out, by wild dogs," intoned Dean.

"And Aaron and his family were all constipated," Bobby informed him.

"It must've been from eating all that unleavened bread, and bitter herbs," posited Dean, looking at his own sandwich, "Because they didn't have peanut butter back then."

"They all got better, though," Bobby assured Sam, who was blinking in bemusement, "I reckon that those plagues of Egypt probably helped, scared the shit right out of 'em."

"God totally smited 'em, all right," Dean agreed, "Ten times, 'cause Pharoah kept getting a hard-on..."

Sam gawped. "Er, that's really... interesting, guys," he stumbled, looking at Cas in bewilderment for some sort of explanation.

Cas also looked confused. "I believe that they may have misheard some of what I read, perhaps because they were feeling unwell and falling asleep," he suggested. "Maybe I should clarify these matters for them later. David fell from his donkey when he was hit by a rock, Dean, nowhere in any version of the Bible is he described as being 'stoned off his ass'. Further, Aaron's household was _consecrated_, not afflicted by gastrointestinal distress, and God visited plagues upon Egypt because it was Pharoah's heart that was hardened, not his..."

"I think it's great that you're finding those Bible stories so engaging," Sam cut him off hurriedly, before the conversation could turn any more surreal.

"Perhaps now that they are feeling better, the boys could go outside for play," suggested Castiel, "That would be an appropriate activity for children. It is physically and mentally healthy for them to make up their own games, and it will allow you some peace to continue with your research. I shall supervise them to ensure they do not come to any harm." His very best Guardian Angel On Duty expression settled on his face.

"That's a great idea, Cas, that would be really helpful," said Sam gratefully, "Hear that guys? Cas will go out with you, and help you play games."

"Yaaaaay!" cheered the boys, each grabbing one of Cas's hands, and practically dragging him outside.

Sam watched them go, with mixed feelings of relief and trepidation. He told himself he was being silly, but he made a mental note to check on them. Dean as an adult had managed to test the patience of an angel; he feared that Dean as a child might make Dean the adult look like a scholarly Anchorite hermit by comparison in the Angel Patience Testing idiom.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

When he poked his head out into the yard a while later, the scene playing out before him took some time to pull into context. Bobby was waving a stick with a faded orange shop rag tied around it, as Dean, who had a small sprig of elm leaves tucked into his waistband, remonstrated with him.

"Go on, out," instructed Bobby sternly, gesturing with the stick.

"But I live here!" protested Dean.

"Not any more, you don't," said Bobby smugly, "So, get lost."

Sam sidled up to Castiel, who was watching from the sidelines. "Er, what game is this?"

"They have decided that they would like to re-enact some stories from the Bible," Castiel told him, "Right now, they are dramatising the Expulsion from Paradise."

"Why should I?" Sam heard Dean demand of Bobby, arms crossed. "Who says?"

"God," Bobby told him shortly, "He says you gotta move out."

"I want to talk to a lawyer!" Dean was equally firm.

"There's no such thing as lawyers, yet," Bobby informed him, "And there won't be for thousands of years. So, tough. Now, get lost."

"How come I gotta go?" Dean wanted to know.

"Because you stole that fruit," Bobby glared accusingly, "Didn't you read the sign? 'Do not steal the fruit'. Be grateful you didn't get run off with a shotgun. That's what old man Harrison does, if he catches us up his apple trees."

"I didn't steal it!" Dean exclaimed, "I didn't know it was stolen!"

"Talk to the sword, 'cause the face aint listenin'," answered Bobby airily.

"Excuse me, that is my cue," Castiel told Sam, stepping off the porch and striding up to Dean. "Hello Dean, sssssssss," he said, performing a very strange set of movements that seemed to involve waggling his entire body, "I've brought you another lovely apple, ssssssssss." Castiel held out an apple to Dean.

"Hello, Serpent," Dean greeted Castiel, "What does this one do?"

"If you eat this one, you will know all about how to fix cars, sssssssssssss," intoned Castiel, performing his strange undulating dance again.

"Cool!" said Dean, biting into the apple. "Hey, I know how to fix cars now!"

"See?" gasped Bobby, shocked, "See? You're doing it again! That's sinful, that is!"

"How can it be sinful?" asked Dean, "Apples are good for you."

"God said not to!" Bobby was the very picture of angelic outrage. "And anyway, cars aren't invented yet!"

"Well, I know how to fix them, now, so maybe I'll make one," smirked Dean.

"Well, you can go and do it somewhere else," Bobby insisted, "Go on, out!"

"Make me!' yelled Dean.

"If you don't leave right now," intoned Bobby, "I will smite you with my flaming sword." He waggled his 'sword' intimidatingly.

"Bite me, you bossy angel," said Dean rudely, taking another bite out of the apple. "Mmmmm, this apple is really good."

"Right, that's it!" Bobby scowled. He pointed his sword at Dean. "Taste fiery smiting from my sword! Zap! Zap! Zap zap zap!"

"Ow! Ow! Ow!" Dean yelped, as though stung, jumping up and down. "Ow! Ow! Help! I'm being smited! Owwww!"

They proceeded to run around, Bobby waving his sword and yelling 'Zap!' while Dean howled in anguish at being driven from the Garden of Eden. Finally, Dean ran off dodging between the car bodies, still howling.

"And stay out, ya idjit!" Bobby yelled after him, waving his sword, "Or next time, I'll let the dogs out! And put some damned britches on!" He turned a grin towards Sam. "Uncle Sammy!" he exclaimed, "I just drove Dean out of Paradise!"

"Er, yeah, I saw," nodded Sam in bewilderment. "You were very... convincing."

"You made a very good Angel of the Lord, Bobby," said Castiel, as Dean came running back from the yard, "Very virtuous. God would be proud of you." Bobby beamed hugely. "And Dean was a very convincing sinner," he added, as Dean grinned up at them.

"Why do I not find that surprising," muttered Sam.

"Now, Dean, give Bobby the fig leaf, and Bobby, give Dean the flaming sword," instructed Castiel. "Would you like a turn at being the Serpent?" the angel asked Sam politely as the boys swapped theatrical accoutrements. "I shall prompt you as to your cue. All you have to do is tempt Bobby with an apple."

"And do the snake dance. So we know you're a snake," prompted Dean.

"Yes, and do the snake dance." Bobby and Dean demonstrated. "Like that."

"Uh, you know what, you're obviously pretty good at that," he told Castiel in bemusement, "I might just go and, er, get back to my research, and, er, leave the Bible stories to the, um, experts. You're really good. All of you."

"Thanks, Uncle Sammy!" piped Dean happily, giving the 'flaming sword' an experimental swoosh.

Bobby stuck the 'fig leaf' in his waistband. "Okay, I'm ready to be tempted," he announced, like a seasoned actor prompting his director.

"Excuse me, Sam, my participation is required at this point," Castiel began his strange wiggling dance again, and approached Bobby with another apple. "Hello, Bobby, ssssssssssss," he began, "Eve sent me with this nice apple she said you should try, sssssssssssss."

"Cool, thanks, Serpent," replied Bobby, taking the apple and biting into it.

"AAAAAAAARGH!" Dean let out a war-cry, and burst between them, a picture of righteous high dudgeon, "That's it, mister, that – is – it! You are officially evicted! So, out! Right now!"

"I'm not goin' anywhere until I finish my apple," Bobby responded, taking another bite.

Sam went back inside, shaking his head. Just when he thought it couldn't possibly get any weirder... still, on the bright side, there was only pretend smiting going on. And both Bobby and Dean were cheerfully eating fresh fruit. Maybe that counted as some sort of minor miracle.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The rain that had been falling intermittently began again, and Castiel and the boys moved back indoors. Bobby and Dean were drawing again while the angel watched them.

"So, how did the smiting go?" asked Sam, when he emerged in search of coffee.

"It started raining," Dean told him gloomily, "And Cas said we had to come inside."

"I thought it best that they play indoors, as the weather has turned inclement," Castiel explained.

"A little bit of water never hurt anyone," muttered Bobby mutinously.

"Playing outdoors when it is raining will result in you becoming very dirty," Castiel observed, "Then you will protest vehemently about having to take another bath tonight."

"The smiting was just getting really interesting," protested Dean.

"The flaming sword would be extinguished by the rain anyway," the angel pointed out logically. Both boys nodded sadly.

"What are you guys drawing, then?" Sam queried. The boys shared a look that he couldn't quite interpret. "Oh, you're still practising your devil's traps," he smiled, taking in the increasingly outlandish form it had evolved to.

"Yeah, that's right, we're drawing that," answered Dean brightly, while Bobby nodded eagerly.

"Well, you keep at," Sam encouraged them, heading back to the study. As he walked unhindered across the rug, both boys sighed.

"Well, that one didn't work, either," humphed Bobby, retrieving their latest attempt from under the rug.

"What are you attempting to achieve?" enquired Castiel.

"Uncle Sammy showed us how to draw a Devil's Trap," explained Dean, showing him the original that Sam had done for them, "And we're trying to change it to make a Bigfoot trap. To catch Uncle Sammy."

"To prove that he's a Bigfoot," added Bobby. "Because we think he is."

Castiel looked confused. "I do not understand," he commented, "Human science has never observed and validated the existence of the humanoid monster referred to as a Bigfoot. No such animal is known to exist."

"It might," said Dean defensively, "Maybe it's just that nobody's ever seen one."

"They're very shy about bein' identified," stated Bobby authoritatively, "On account of, they don't want to get found out, and get sold to a zoo."

Castiel considered this. As an angel, he was not omniscient; that was the province of his Father, so he could not state with absolute certainty that there was no such thing.

"What makes you think that your Uncle Sammy is a Bigfoot?" he asked instead.

Dean and Bobby set about informing him of their research. They pointed out the obvious factors of Sam's height, the size of his shoes, and the shagginess of his hair. They showed him the outline of Sam's foot, described the hairiness of his legs, and the fact that his leg hair 'really smelled kinda weird when you set it on fire'. They related the fact that he sounded 'totally like a Bigfoot when he gets poked', and they informed him of the clincher, the magazine they'd found in the shed, with the pictures of Chinese lady Bigfoots. "Although we still haven't exactly figured out why they don't have any clothes on," Bobby admitted truthfully, not wanting to leave out any information.

Castiel considered their findings. On the one hand, he was quite sure that Sam was not actually anything more than a tall human – certainly, plenty of even taller people existed. On the other hand, some of the literature he had consulted regarding development of human children had emphasised the normality and benefits of role-playing, make-believe and unstructured games in their normal, healthy mental maturation. Bobby and Sam were clearly casting themselves as scientists, or explorers, perhaps, tracking down and describing a new species, a worthy and idealistic goal for any scientist. They had gathered data, considered the evidence, and formulated a theory, exploring the concepts of logic, and cause and effect.

And Sam was so grateful to him for engaging with the boys in their play. He had been happy, no, eager to leave them in Castiel's care, so clearly he approved of what Castiel was doing.

He made a decision.

"If you are going to try to trap a Bigfoot," he told them, "Then there are some further alterations you will need to make to your trap. For example, this picture of a naked woman of Asiatic ancestry is not necessary..."

Dean seemed a little disappointed at the loss of the naked lady, but he paid close attention as Castiel talked, and drew.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam sat back, stretched, and smiled to himself. Castiel was doing a fine job keeping the boys occupied – the last time he'd looked in on them, they'd been intently focused on their drawing, in animated discussion, with the angel watching on. (He couldn't help himself, he'd pulled out his cell, and taken another picture). Now that he wasn't being distracted every few minutes, he finally felt like he was actually making some progress on the counter-spell.

"Hey, guys," he said, heading into the living room, "We should start thinking about dinner, don't you think?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," chorused the boys. Sam had been dealing with them for long enough to become suspicious when they sounded so compliant. He watched them warily, but all they did was smile back at him guilelessly.

He took the time to cook up some pasta and meat sauce, not wanting to prompt another projectile vomiting episode by feeding them take out. They ate their dinner with a minimum of fuss, and only a modicum of slurping.

"Thanks for your help, Cas," Sam told the angel as he cleared up afterwards, "You've been a big help, keeping them occupied."

"I am glad to have been of assistance, Sam," Castiel told him, "I was not aware of how... gratifying it can be, to watch children at play. They are highly imaginative. If you like, I can return tomorrow."

"That would be really helpful," Sam replied gratefully.

"Do you require assistance with putting them to bed?" enquired the angel. "I could fetch the Old Testament again, and read them some more stories. I think they would particularly enjoy some of the material in Revelation, or perhaps the story of Ehud and Eglon – anything to do with implied bowel movements seems to catch their interest..."

"No, no, that's fine, but thanks for asking," Sam said quickly, "They seem to have settled down pretty well tonight. It must've been all that smiting that's worn them out."

"Very well, I will see you tomorrow," Castiel informed him. "Goodbye, Sam."

"Yeah, see you later, Cas." The angel took his leave in a flapping swirl of trench coat.

"Will Cas come back tomorrow?" asked Dean hopefully, as Sam tucked him into bed.

"Uh-huh," confirmed Sam, "He'll be back to do some more stuff with you guys while I work."

"Are you figuring out the problem with the evil witch's spell, Uncle Sammy?" asked Bobby.

"Actually, yeah, I think I can see what needs to be done," smiled Sam.

"That's really cool, that you help people," Dean said, "Saving people is a good thing to do."

"That's just what my big brother says," Sam grinned. Jimi settled himself on the end of Dean's bed as Sam turned out the light. "Good night, boys."

"Night, Uncle Sammy," they chorused, snuggling under the bedclothes.

Sam's Hunter's sense of suspicious started jumping up and down, banging its neurons together in an attempt to get his attention. He shook his head, and decided that he was just being paranoid. Probably because he was tired. Trying to do research, and worry about two seven year olds, had been draining. He decided to take a shower and fall into bed, then tackle the counter spell afresh the next day.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"If it works, I think we have enough to prove he's really a Bigfoot," Dean whispered into the darkness.

"O' course, if he's really a Bigfoot, he'll deny it," Bobby pointed out. He sounded a little uncertain.

"Is there something wrong?" asked Dean.

"Well, I've been thinkin', about that magazine full of lady Bigfoots," Bobby told him.

"What about it?" pressed Dean.

"Well, you know how we know they're lady Bigfoots?" Bobby went on.

"Yeah, it's because they're hairy. You know,_ there_," Dean confirmed.

"Right. But, there's something we don't know," said Bobby. He went on to describe the vital piece of evidence they were missing.

"Hmmmm," mused Dean, "You're right, you know. That makes sense. So, if he's a boy Bigfoot..."

"The thing is, how do we find that out?" wondered Bobby.

Dean was considering the problem, when he heard the shower start. "I have an idea," he said, sliding out of bed, "Come on – and be real quiet."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The shower felt pretty damned good after a day hunched over ancient tomes, reading foreign languages. Sam let the hot water run over his aching shoulders, then started to wash his hair. He felt better with every passing minute. He hummed to himself, then yawned, anticipating a good night's sleep, not worrying about how he'd deal with dividing his attention between the spell and the two kids.

As he was rinsing the shampoo out of his hair, there was a sudden cold draft. With an exasperated noise, he reached out blindly for the shower curtain.

It wasn't there.

Puzzled, he finished rinsing off his head, and opened his eyes.

The shower curtain was pulled back; Dean and Bobby stood silently on the bathroom mat, staring at him seriously.

"What the...?" Sam's eyes bugged, as he grabbed the shower curtain and grabbed it to himself. _"AAAAAAAAARGH! What the hell are you two doing?" _he shrieked, two octaves above his normal speaking voice. _"Go back to bed this minute!" _He flapped a hand at them, clutching the shower curtain with the other.

An inscrutable, knowing look passed between the boys, and they left as silently and solemnly as they'd sneaked in.

When he looked in on them again, they were asleep. He let out a strangled humph of bewilderment, and went to bed himself.

Dean opened one eye. "I'd say that confirms it," he whispered once they heard Uncle Sammy head off to bed.

"Yup," Bobby agreed, "Without a doubt, he's a Bigfoot."

* * *

><p>Reviews are the Shower Curtain Billowing Around The Winchester Of Your Choice in the Shower Of Life!<p> 


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

"So, in future," both boys sighed a little at the indication that the lecture might finally be coming to an end, "Stay out of the bathroom when I'm in there. Sneaking up on people in the shower is... rude."

"Why?" asked Dean, a tad grumpy at having his breakfast interrupted, because hey, it was breakfast, and nobody should be lectured over breakfast.

"Because when people are in the shower, they generally don't have any clothes on!" Sam answered, exasperated.

"But you see us with no clothes on," Bobby pointed out, "When you make us have a bath." His tone was slightly reproachful.

"That's different," Sam said tersely.

"Why is it different?" Dean was genuinely curious.

"Because... it just is," Sam insisted, trying not to let his voice sound too petulant. Finding the two of them just standing there, staring, with such serious expressions, had rattled him. If they'd pointed and laughed, tittered even, made childish remarks about the effects of maturity and adult levels of circulating androgenic hormones on the male human body, he probably could've dealt with that better, but they'd just stood there, and... stared. Like a couple of scientists observing an interesting specimen under the microscope.

Fortunately, they seemed contented enough to let the matter drop. Then, after breakfast, a faint_ flap-flap_ noise, followed by the boys' cheering, alerted him that Castiel had arrived. There was a moment of silence, then his cell rang.

"Hello, Sam," said the angel's voice.

"Er, hi, Cas," Sam replied, a bit perplexed as to why Cas was calling him. "Um, was that you I just heard in the living room?"

"Yes."

Sam sighed when no further explanation was forthcoming. "So, er, if you're in the living room, why are you calling me?"

"Moving my vessel is very difficult at the moment," the angel answered. Sam rolled his eyes, and headed for the living room. Dean and Bobby were grinning hugely, and sitting on Castiel's feet, arms wrapped around his legs. "When I arrived, they insisted on sitting upon my feet," he said into his phone.

"If he tries to take off again, we want to see if he can fly with us hanging onto him!" smiled Bobby.

"Bobby says that they want to see if I can fly with them hanging on to me," Castiel relayed into his phone.

"He can't get away if we're sitting on him!" giggled Dean triumphantly, hugging Castiel's leg, "He has to stay with us now!"

"Dean says that I can't get away if they are sitting on me," Castiel repeated, "And that I have to stay here with them now..."

"Cas, I'm standing in front of you," Sam prompted, "You can put your phone away now."

"Very well. I am going to hang up now." Castiel shut his phone, and looked down at the two giggling boys clinging to his legs.

"Dean certainly seems to be less inclined to complain about impingement upon his personal space," the angel observed, shuffling his feet experimentally.

"Look, Uncle Sammy!" Bobby said brightly, "We've caught an angel!"

"I bet nobody's ever caught an angel like this before," said Dean excitedly.

Castiel considered that. "You are correct," he announced. "Nobody has ever captured an angel by deploying two small children to encumber the human vessel's feet."

"That's because this particular angel doesn't want to do anything that might hurt you," Sam told them tersely, "Now get of Cas's feet!"

"But what if he flies away again?" asked Dean in a small wistful voice, clinging to Castiel's trousers.

"I am not going to fly away, Dean," Castiel reassured him, "I am here to supervise you while your Uncle Sammy works on countering the evil witch's spell."

"Yaaaay!" the boys cheered again.

"That's great!" enthused Sam, "This is very good of you, Cas. So, what are you guys going to do today?"

"We have some research to do, too," Bobby told him, while Dean nodded seriously.

Sam looked doubtful.

"It is a role-playing game, in which they are scientists," explained Castiel, "They are looking to discover a new species that has not yet been described by the scientific establishment. The literature I consulted suggested that such games, playing at being adults in certain professions, is a normal and healthy activity, appropriate to their stage of development."

"Well, that's... good," nodded Sam, a little relieved at just how normal a game that sounded, "So, I'll go do my research, and you can do yours. You can tell me all about your new species later, okay?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they chorused obediently. He looked at them with a certain amount of suspicion, but decided not to worry about it. After all, they had an angel watching out for them.

They watched him head into the study.

"After last night's experiment, I think we have all the proof we need," decided Bobby, running a critical eye over the latest version of the Bigfoot trap.

"Definitely," agreed Dean, adding the final touches to one of the squiggles around the diagram. Making sure Uncle Sammy was definitely in the study, he placed it carefully under the rug. "It's time to announce our findings."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam checked the ancient reference again, and added another item to his list. Finally, he was getting to a point where he was ready to start constructing the counter-spell. Castiel's help had been invaluable. He sighed; it was just as well the end was in sight – the boys sneaking up on him in the shower was the sort of shock he really didn't need. What he was supposed to do if they started asking questions about That Sort Of Thing, he didn't know. It had been traumatic enough the first time around, when Dean had had The Talk with him. He didn't think he could possibly cope with having to do anything like that the other way around...

He headed for the kitchen intent on coffee, then stepped into the living room while it brewed.

"Hey, guys," he said, "How's your research going? Making any..." he stopped, feet apparently stuck to the floor. He looked down, but there didn't seem to be anything wrong with the rug, it was just that his feet wouldn't move...

"Aha!" crowed Dean in triumph, "The final proof! You _are_ a Bigfoot!"

"_What?"_ Sam gawped at them, utterly bemused.

"We've found you out, Uncle Sammy!" smirked Bobby, "We know for sure now. You're a Bigfoot!"

"What? I'm not a Bigfoot!" Sam protested, trying to move his feet. "There's no such thing, I told you! Cas, tell them there's no such thing as a Bigfoot," he appealed to the angel.

"Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, Sam," Castiel told him equably, "Bobby and Dean have applied the scientific method. They are to be commended for their thoroughness. They posed a hypothesis, set out to gather data to test it, assembled their evidence, then proposed a theory."

"What? What hypothesis? What theory?" asked Sam, bewildered.

"That you are a Bigfoot," explained Castiel.

"What the... why the hell are my feet stuck to the rug?" demanded Sam.

"Because there's a Bigfoot trap under the rug!" Dean told him.

"There's no such thing as a Bigfoot trap," growled Sam.

"Yes, there is," Dean shot back.

"No, there's not!" Sam was equally emphatic.

"Yes there is," countered Bobby, "It's like a Devil's Trap, only a bit different. It catches Bigfoots instead of demons."

"So, if there's no such thing as Bigfoots," smirked Dean, "Why are you stuck on it?"

Sam narrowed his eyes at the angel. "Cas..."

"The basic principle was sound," Castiel informed him, "And a remarkable bit of extrapolation, given that they are seven-year-olds. They required only a minimal amount of assistance with the details of appropriate sigils."

"There is no such thing as a Bigfoot trap," repeated Sam, "Because there's _no such thing as a Bigfoot!_"

"Yes there is!" Dean stated emphatically, "And we know you are one! We can _prove_ it!" He held up the outline of Sam's foot. "You have really big feet," he pointed out, "And your hair is really shaggy. Plus, you're tall."

"Then there's the leg hair," added Bobby, "We've seen how much you have. And it smells really weird when it burns."

"And, you're hairy. You know, _hairy_," Dean added knowingly. "We _saw_."

"And, you sound like a Bigfoot." Bobby poked Sam briskly in the side.

"OW! Hey what was that for?" Sam was utterly confused. "Cas, what the hell is going on?"

"And finally," announced Dean, in the tone of a politician about to release photos of a rival doing something of dubious legality with a young lady who's been paid for her services, "We know you're a Bigfoot, because we found... your lady Bigfoot magazine!" He flapped one of adult Dean's porn mags at Sam's horrified face.

"Oh my God," breathed Sam, his eyes wide and his face going red, as he grabbed at the tattered old copy of Busty Asian Beauties and looked at it like it had bitten him, "Where the hell did you find this?"

"See how guilty he looks?" Dean pointed out.

"We know they're lady Bigfoots, 'cause they're hairy. Like _you_," announced Bobby with devastating finality.

"Hey, listen, I – am – not – a – Bigfoot!" yelled Sam in exasperation.

"I told you," said Bobby, almost primly, "I told you, if he's a real Bigfoot, he'll deny it. Real Bigfoots always deny it."

Sam rolled his eyes. "All right then," then he sighed, "Yeah, okay, you're right, I'm a Bigfoot."

"HE IS A BIGFOOT!" chorused Dean and Bobby enthusiastically, high-fiving.

"Cas! What the hell is going on?" demanded Sam again. "Why am I stuck to the rug? Tell them there's no such thing as a Bigfoot!"

"They did present a convincing case, Sam," Castiel pointed out, "And you did just admit to being one."

"We should celebrate discovering this species," declared Dean. "Let there be ice cream!"

"We have to name it, too, a proper scientific name," added Bobby, looking thoughtful, "How about, _Bigfootus grumpyus_?"

"_Bigfootus yellsalotus_," mused Dean.

"_Bigfootus reallytallus_," Bobby suggested.

"_Bigfootus nakedladyus_," giggled Dean.

"_Bigfootus hairydownthereus_," posited Bobby, nodding knowingly.

Sam glared at Bobby and Dean, who were practically dancing with excitement, and Castiel. "I will get out of this trap," he rumbled dangerously, "I will get out of this trap, eventually, they'll want to be fed, or your phone will run out of minutes, and you'll need me, and I will get out of this trap, and it's going to make your Expulsion from Paradise look like a limousine ride..."

"It's okay, Uncle Sammy," Dean grinned up at him, "We knew already. We'll never tell anyone." He knelt down, lifted the corner of the rug, and tore the paper. Sam's feet came unglued.

"Your secret is safe with us," declared Bobby emphatically.

"And of course, we'll never sell you to a zoo," Dean assured him, "Because we want you to stay here, with us. So you can help people. You know, save them from evil witches' spells."

"We'll protect you from anybody who tries to take you away and put you in a zoo," Bobby stated firmly, crossing his arms to show he meant business.

"They are sincere, Sam," Castiel told him, "They just wished to prove that you are a Bigfoot in order to satisfy their own curiosity. They have no desire or intention to offer you for sale to any zoological establishment, private or public."

Sam blinked. "Uh. Okay." He stepped off the rug, and stared in utter bemusement from the boys to the angel and back. "I'll just, um, I'll just, just, get some coffee, and, and, yeah." With a perplexed expression on his face, he wandered off in the direction of the kitchen. "Coffee, I need coffee..."

"He seems a bit, you know, worried," mused Bobby.

"Perhaps he's afraid that now we've proven his Bigfootness, somebody will find out," suggested Dean.

"But we promised him we wouldn't tell anyone!" Bobby said. "We said we'd protect him from any Bigfoot-nappers!"

"Perhaps you need to find a way to demonstrate your honourable intentions, with respect to keeping his secret, and not allowing big game hunters to abduct him," Castiel told them. "It is often said that actions speak louder than words."

Dean beamed up at Castiel. "That's a great idea, Cas!" he enthused, "And I know just how you can help!"

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam was convinced his head was going to explode. He found that he wasn't just worrying about what two seven year old boys were getting up to; he was now worrying about what two seven year old boys and a clueless angel were getting up to. He told himself it wasn't Castiel's fault; the books he read probably did say a lot about the normality of children playing role-play games, but he was willing to bet that nowhere in any child-rearing book yet written did any author explicitly spell out that 'It is not appropriate for an occultly charged individual to assist small children in trying to prove that their ersatz uncle is a Bigfoot, especially if it means helping them to devise a pentagram that will glue his feet to the rug or encourage them to sneak into the bathroom to check for manscaping'...

Coffee. He needed coffee. Another mug. Maybe not a mug. Maybe a bucket. And something to eat. And some Tylenol. And a fortnight in the Bahamas. Sighing, he headed back out to the kitchen.

He'd barely stepped out of the study when he was assailed by the depressingly recognisable sound of an atomic death ray gun.

"Bla-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-ah!" went Bobby, in his Yfrontman costume once more. _Oh goody_, Sam noted, _At least this time the atomic death ray gun isn't pointed at me..._

"Uncle Sammy!" said Dean happily, the awful industrial strength bra dangling from his shoulders, "We're ready to protect you from Bigfootnappers! My boobie cannon is charged up, and ready to go!"

"And my atomic death ray gun never runs out of atomic death rays," Bobby explained, waving his egg beater. "Anybody tries to get near you, they're toast!"

"Uh, that's great, guys," said Sam with a wan smile, "But right now, I think... _huh_?" he felt his own jaw drop.

"We are the Underwear Avengers," Castiel announced seriously, "Dedicated to the protection of Bigfoots, as they are an endangered species."

"What the hell are you supposed to be?" asked Sam, suddenly regretting the question.

"That's CorsetCas!" enthused Dean.

"Oh, of course," said Sam faintly, "That would explain why he's wearing a corset. Over his trench coat. How very silly of me."

"That is my Underwear Avengers secret identity," the angel intoned seriously. "Please observe and be suitably intimidated by my Tassles Of Doom." He performed a shimmying motion, strangely reminiscent of the snake dance, and two tassles dangling from the bust of the garment began to spin. "Please imagine that deadly laser beams are now firing out of my Tassles Of Doom," the angel instructed.

"Uh, okay, that's very... intimidating," Sam started to feel faint. "Oh, look, and here's your faithful sidekick, Shortsdog." Jimi made his entrance, grinning doggily under the men's underwear on his head.

"It's not your shorts, Uncle Sammy," Dean told him virtuously, " 'Cause you said, don't put your shorts on Jimi's head. So we didn't."

"I provided them my vessel's shorts, for the purposes of equipping the dog, so that they might not disobey the instruction you gave them," Castiel explained. "I do not wish to undermine your authority."

"So, you see, you are absolutely safe," Bobby told Sam with a winning smile, "We will stop anybody from grabbing you, and putting you in a zoo."

"Because you're an engendered species," added Dean.

"The word is 'endangered', Dean," Castiel reminded him gently.

"Oh, yeah, you're an endangered species," Dean corrected himself, "That means, you might die out. You need to have babies, Uncle Sammy."

"Not right now," Bobby told him generously, "But before you die. So you don't die out."

"Uh, okaaaaaay, I'll... take that under advisement," Sam found himself slowly backing away from his would-be protectors. "But, uh, it would be better to stop any, er, would-be Bigfoot-nappers before they get into the house, so, um, why don't you go and, you know, patrol... outside?" he gave them a desperate little smile.

Bobby nodded. "That makes sense," he decided, "Stop 'em before they get too close. Come on, Avengers, let's go avenge outside!"

The boys ran outside, shouting "Bla-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-ah!" and "Boobi-da-boobi-da-boobi-da!", with Castiel and Jimi following them. Sam returned to the study, and let his head fall forward onto the desk. He was starting to feel a certain urge to wear his own underwear on his head, and possibly run in small circles. Maybe even yell "I'm a teapot!" a few times.

At least after that he had a bit of piece and quiet.

Unlike the Jehovah's Witnesses who tried to visit the yard; they ran, screaming, and made notes about the occupants of that particular property to be passed on to other members of their congregation:

_Two feral children, savage dog, transvestite – DO NOT CALL._

* * *

><p>What's your Underwear Avengers secret identity? I rather like the idea of being a superhero called Bedsox - not just fighting evil things, but my feet would always be toasty warm, and I would be ready to nap anywhere at a moment's notice.<p> 


	14. Chapter 14

Okay, so Castiel might've helped just a weeny leetle bit with the mojo to make the Bigfoot trap work. But he's just trying to get into the spirit of the thing. And you may now assume that he has reclaimed his underwear, as a brief stint going commando to chase away Jehovah's Witnesses. Let's just hope his vessel isn't allergic to dog hair. (My husband was allergic to our cat; one day, she made a comfy nest in a pile of clean laundry that he'd neglected to put away. His shorts just happened to be on top of the pile. He learned after that to put his clean laundry away quickly.) No doubt there are Cas girls who would volunteer to rub on some cortisone ointment if he develops a rash. No doubt there are slash fans out there who would like Dean to do it for him.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 14<strong>

After the excitement of seeing off the Jehovah's Witnesses, Yfrontman and Braboy prowled the yard looking for potential threats to the endangered Bigfoot who was currently muttering to himself, and wondering if it was too early in the day for a small shot of something alcoholically medicinal in his coffee. They didn't find anything more threatening that a rather placid skunk, for which Uncle Sammy would no doubt be grateful.

"There doesn't seem to be anything very threatening here, now," observed Yfrontman.

"We really showed those Morons they shouldn't mess with us," smirked Braboy.

"I thought they were Seventh Day Dentists," Yfrontman looked puzzled.

"The terms you intend are 'Mormons' and 'Seventh Day Adventists'" corrected CorsetCas, "And they were in fact Jehovah's Witnesses."

"Well, we scared 'em off, good, whatever they were," Braboy sounded smugly satisfied.

The lack of further villains for the Underwear Avengers to defeat made the boys decide that it was probably safe to return to their civilian identities.

"Is there anything we can do to help Uncle Sammy? You know, with the witch," asked Dean.

"He has suggested previously that we can be of the most help by staying out of the way, and giving him time and quiet to complete his research," Castiel informed them.

Bobby let out a disgruntled huff. "Bein' quiet isn't much fun," he muttered, "It's boring."

"What's he going to do when he catches the evil witch?" Dean wanted to know.

"The witch is already dead; your Uncle Sammy is trying to undo the evil spell that she cast on her book," the angel explained.

"'Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live'," intoned Bobby. "It's in the Bible. Father Flaherty's read it. He's pretty keen on all the 'Thou Shalt Not's."

"How do you kill a witch?" wondered Dean. "If they do evil spells, and stuff?"

"Very carefully," answered Castiel.

"People used to set fire to 'em," Bobby said ominously. "Like martyrs. Only different."

"What's a martyr?" asked Dean.

"Somebody who died in a really, really gruesome way," related Bobby with relish. "With lots of blood. And bones all stickin' out."

"Burning at the stake was traditionally a method of execution for accused witches," Castiel told them, "But very few actual witches were ever killed – mostly it was women, perhaps with no family ties, who had somehow earned the jealousy or enmity of their communities, or who fell prey to the greed and corruption of paid witchfinders, who were accused and condemned."

"So, how do you tell if someone's an evil witch?" asked Bobby.

"Yeah," echoed Dean, turning attentively to Castiel. "Hey, Cas, how did they find out who the witches were?"

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam was giving his eyes, his brain and his nerves a break when he found Castiel and the boys back in the living room. Castiel looked solemn, sitting on the sofa with a large book open, while Dean sat in his lap, and Bobby knelt next to him, peering carefully at the pages.

" 'When a woman thinks alone, she thinks evil'," translated Castiel from the Latin. Sam's jaw dropped.

"Cas, are you... are you reading them the _Maleus Maleficarum_?" he asked incredulously. He felt one of his eyes starting to twitch again. "That's hardly suitable material for seven year olds!"

"Bobby and Dean wished to know about the identification of witches," Castiel explained, "I have told them that historically, few witches were correctly accused and sentenced, due to the inherently misogynistic and patriarchal dominance of society in the Early Modern period by the men of the established Church."

"It was terrible, Uncle Sammy," Dean told him solemnly, "They just grabbed women they didn't like, and set fire to them, for no good reason!"

"Sometimes, they did it for money," Bobby glared accusingly at the book, "Because they were arrogant men, and they wanted women to be their servants."

"They tortured them, and they weren't even real witches!" Dean sounded absolutely scandalised.

"It was bullying, is what it was," declared Bobby, "They were just bullies, and they bullied ladies, just 'cause ladies couldn't fight back."

"It's not right to pick on somebody, just because you don't like 'em," Dean muttered, "Ladies aren't evil just because they're ladies. Men can be evil, too."

"You gotta be polite to ladies," emphasised Bobby, "If you want a lady to make you a sandwich, you gotta say, 'Please', _and _'Thank You'."

Sam sighed in relief. Maybe the moral lessons of the horrors of witch-finding trials of the 15th and 16th century were more educational for small children that he'd anticipated. "It's great to hear you figure that out," he nodded approvingly.

" 'All witchcraft stems from carnal lust, which is in women insatiable'," translated Castiel.

"There's that lust, again," Bobby pointed out, "But witches didn't drive around in loud cars, then. Did they ride around on loud horses, or ride around screamin' and yellin' and disturbing folks?"

"Broomsticks," Dean said firmly, "They rode around on broomsticks. Really loud, noisy broomsticks."

"Yeah, that'd be it," nodded Bobby, "Keepin' folks awake at night, and makin' the dogs bark, zoomin' around on their really loud broomsticks."

"Making little kids wake up and cry," added Dean.

"Yeah," agreed Bobby, "And people would go outside, and say to the witches, 'Hey, keep the noise down, how's a body supposed to get any sleep?', and 'You kids knock that off, or I'll call the cops!' and 'Get a haircut and get a real job, you delinquents!'," he elaborated.

"I bet they did rollbacks and donuts, on the roads," Dean said with disapproval, "Made their brooms squeal on the tar, and left big black streaks, and clouds of smelly smoke."

"That's what real witches, would do," confirmed Bobby. "Wouldn't they, Uncle Sammy? If they were really evil witches?"

"Uh, ask Cas," grinned Sam desperately, heading for the kitchen, and more coffee. Maybe he'd save time, just take a spoon, and eat the grounds out of the packet...

They boys shook their heads as Castiel read to them from the Witch-hunters' Handbook.

"That's not fair," said Dean emphatically, "If I was looking for evil witches, I'd make absolutely sure they were really an evil witch before I set 'em on fire. You'd have to catch 'em in the act, doing evil spells, or witchy stuff."

"Yeah," said Bobby, with waxing enthusiasm, "You'd have to ask 'em, and prove that they were a witch. Like we proved Uncle Sammy was a Bigfoot. It'd be like being a detective, only looking for witchy stuff." He smiled widely. "We could be, like, Bobby and Dean – Witch Detectives!"

"The word for a person who seeks out and deals with witches is 'Inquisitor'," Castiel told them.

"Wow," breathed Bobby, "That sounds like a really important word."

"Well, it would be a really important job," reasoned Dean, "Finding out evil witches, and saving people." The both looked speculatively at Castiel.

If he had been less angelic and more human, he probably would have been worried.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

The next time Sam emerged from the study, the Gleesome Threesome (plus dog) were outside again. He watched them through the kitchen window. Dean had a bright red rag on his head like a turban, while Bobby had found a long-sleeved shirt in lurid scarlet. Castiel stood watching them in an unconcerned fashion, as they apparently had some conversation amongst themselves.

It was only as he added the sugar to his coffee that he realised that the boys had tied Castiel to a post.

On the one hand, Castiel was an angel, with some serious seniority in Heaven. He carried around upon his person enough mojo to make Criss Angel bite through his own mascara wand in tearful, impotent envy. There was, logically, nothing a couple of seven year olds could do to harm him.

On the other hand, this was Dean and Bobby.

Sam put down his coffee, and made his way outside...

It wasn't so much a conversation as a Q & A session, with a fairly invariant theme.

"You're a witch!" said Dean accusingly, "Admit it!"

"I am not," replied Castiel calmly.

"Yes you are!' countered Bobby. "We know it, so 'fess up!"

"I am not a witch," Castiel stated.

"We know you're a witch, because we saw you fly!" Dean pointed out. "You flew away yesterday!"

"I am Castiel. I am an Angel of the Lord, a Warrior of Heaven," Castiel told them. "I flew away with my wings. Witches do not have wings. They ride broomsticks. You said that yourself."

"Oh, yeah?" growled Dean suspiciously. "How come we can't see your wings, then?"

"Because they are invisible," Castiel replied.

"Well, maybe you do have a broomstick, and that's invisible too," crowed Bobby in a triumph of logic, looking pleased with himself. "Because you're a witch!"

"I am not a witch, Inquisitor Bobby," Castiel said mildly.

"Yes you are!"

"I am not."

Yes, you are!"

"No, I am not."

What the hell is going on?" demanded Sam. "What do you boys think you are doing?"

"We're having a witch trial!" Dean told him excitedly, "And Castiel is our witch!"

"Except he won't confess," sighed Bobby glumly. "Confess, witch!"

"I will not. Inquisitor Dean and Inquisitor Bobby were most unimpressed by the efforts of earlier witch-hunters," explained Castiel, "They think that they could do a much more thorough job."

"So, we're going to prove that he's a witch, before we set him on fire," Dean concluded.

"Guys, he's an angel, not a witch!" yelped Sam, looking to Castiel for back-up. "Cas, you cannot possibly be going along with this!"

"They are merely attempting to prove that I am a witch," Castiel assured him, "Since that is not the case, they will not succeed."

"We might," muttered Bobby sulkily.

"Oh, God," Sam almost wailed, pinching the bridge of his nose, "Look, I'll be a character witness for him, okay?" he said to the boys. "I've known Cas for years now. He's one of the good guys. The vast majority of the time. Seriously, he saved my as- er, I mean, he saved my skin on a number of occasions. He is, most definitely an Angel of the Lord."

"And a Warrior of Heaven," prompted Castiel.

"Yeah, that too, a Warrior of Heaven," Sam amended, "With an angelic sword – which, I might add, you have both seen with your own eyes. So, he's not a witch."

Dean squinted thoughtfully at Castiel. "Are you sure you're not a witch?" he persisted.

"I am certain of it," intoned Castiel.

"Are you really sure?" pressed Bobby, with fading hope.

"I am completely sure," nodded Castiel.

"You can do stuff that is a bit, you know, witchy," Dean pointed out.

"Nonetheless, I am not a witch," Castiel reiterated.

Bobby remained less that totally convinced. "If you're an angel," he mused, "Escape, and go back inside."

"Very well." With a swirl of trench coat and a flapping sound, Castiel disappeared. A few moments later, he appeared in the doorway. Dean and Bobby let out heavy groans of disappointment.

"He's not a witch, then," sighed Bobby, "A witch would've needed a broomstick to do that."

"All right," said Sam, with some relief, "So you both believe that Cas is not a witch?"

"He's not," Dean sounded like someone had taken away his favourite toy.

Sam headed back inside before his coffee went cold. Those two kids would be the death of him, they really would...

"I know you are disappointed that you did not prove me to be a witch," Castiel consoled them, "But you are to be commended for taking into account all the evidence."

"Yeah, well, I guess this whole witch-finding thing is harder than it looks," admitted Bobby.

Castiel cocked his head. "Traditionally," he said, "The Inquisition did not concern itself with facts and evidence concerning an accused witch's guilt. Mere accusation was considered adequate grounds for execution."

Both boys looked at him quizzically.

"What that means," the angel elaborated, "Is that real Inquisitors would burn an accused witch anyway, whether the person was actually guilty or not."

Bobby and Dean looked at one another, smiled, and began to gather sticks.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Sam was checking his interpretation of a particularly convoluted passage when he smelled smoke. Leaving the study, he headed outside.

"Guys?" he called, "Hey can I smell smoke, is somethi- _whatthefuckareyoudoing?-!_"

Castiel stood serenely in the middle of a small bonfire, with the flames licking cheerfully around his knees. Dean and Bobby grinned happily as he rushed towards them.

"Hi, Uncle Sammy!" said Bobby, "We're burning a witch!"

"Cas said that Inquisitors burned people whether they were witches or not, so it was all right," Dean assured him. "He doesn't mind."

"We did ask," Bobby said. "We said 'Thank you'."

Sam's jaw dropped in horror. "You set fire to an angel?" he breathed, shocked.

"Technically, they set fire to the wood, not to me," explained Castiel above the brisk crackle of the fire, "And my Grace enables me to remain unharmed..."

"That's not the point!" shrieked Sam. "You set fire to an angel!" he berated the boys. "Put it out! Put it out _right now_!"

"Very well." Castiel waved a hand, and extinguished the blaze, while the boys made disappointed noises and glared mournfully at him.

"Get inside! Everybody! Right now!" ordered Sam. Dean and Bobby muttered mutinously, but did as they were told. "You too, Castiel," humphed Sam, heading for the house.

"Where do I even start?" he said, exasperated, waving his arms about, "Where do I even start with this? Setting people on fire is never okay! All right? What is it with seven year olds, and pyromaniac tendencies? Neither of you is to set anything on fire, at all! Do you hear me?"

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," intoned Dean and Bobby, watching Sam stalk and rant.

"And letting people set you on fire, that's never okay either. What happens if they decide to try it with somebody who's not an Angel of the Lord?"

"My apologies, Sam," Castiel offered, actually sounding contrite, "I shall not invite them to set me alight again."

"Okay. Okay." Sam let out a breath he hadn't realised that he'd been holding. "Look, there's nothing wrong with playing games, just, just... can you just try to do something normal? Play a _normal_ game! One that does involve setting fire to anybody! Or gluing my feet to the rug! Or wearing women's underwear! Or, or, or looking at pornographic magazines!"

"What sort of game, Uncle Sammy?" asked Dean, genuinely curious.

"I don't know!" Sam sounded just a little shrill, "Normal games, that normal seven-year-olds play! Like Hospitals, or playing House, or, or, or, Tea Parties, or something!"

"Um, okay," said Bobby dubiously. "We'll see what we can do."

"Great! Great." Sam smiled slightly manically. Or maybe he was gritting his teeth. "I'll get back to work then. Remember what I said about not setting anything on fire."

"We will," Castiel assured him.

"Good." With one last bemused glare, Sam headed from the study.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

He had to give them credit – the did try to play Hospitals. Although the dramatic dialogue drifting in from the living room proved to be equally distracting.

"Ooooooooooh," he heard Dean moan.

"What's the matter here, Nurse Cas?" Bobby's voice enquired, all brisk authority.

"This man needs help, Doctor Bobby," intoned Castiel in a serious voice, "He is sick."

"Hmmmmmm," Doctor Bobby sounded thoughtful, "When did this start, Nurse Cas?"

"About an hour ago," answered Nurse Cas, equally gravely.

"Owwwwwwwwwww," went Dean.

"Now then, Mr Winchester," said Doctor Bobby in a professional voice, "We'll just have a look, and see what the trouble is..."

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!" went Dean.

"Is it serious, Doctor?" enquired Nurse Cas.

"Hmmmmmm... what? Oh, wow, this is amazing!" declared Doctor Bobby.

"What is it, doc?" moaned Dean, "You can tell me. Give it to me straight."

"This man's not sick," intoned Doctor Bobby, "He's... having a baby!"

"Oooooooo- OOOOOOOOO- ooooooooooh!" howled Dean.

On the up side, Sam decided, at least Dean's labour pain drowned out his own despairing whimpers.

* * *

><p>I think I might have to stop torturing Sam soon - he's just about at the end of his tether. Who would've guessed it would turn out to be so much fun?<p> 


	15. Chapter 15

Thank you to maybe-moey for pointing out my typo in Ch14 - if nobody tells me when I get things right, be it continuity, or idiom, or language, I'll never learn, and I can't fix 'em. As to why Dean in this seven year old incarnation doesn't know as much about the supernatural as he did first time around, well, who is to say how these things work? In this instance it's the Great Big Flashing Cursor In The Sky Wielded By The Author that says so. :-). Maybe the spell did that so that if anybody who did know about supernatural stuff triggered her book's booby traps, they would be even less able to tell anyone what had happened, in the event that they survived. Or it could be because of bunnies.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 15<strong>

Sam gazed at the notes in front of him. He'd done it – he was confident that the counter-spell he'd outlined would undo the witch's curses. His sanity was hanging by a thread. He had to clamp his jaw shut to stop himself from gibbering. His eye was intermittently doing that twitching thing again. He suspected that if he listened carefully, he might even hear the gurgling sound as his brain quietly liquefied (if Dean would stop howling for a moment, anyway). He was experiencing a strange and overwhelming urge to wear his socks on his ears, and run into the living room, yelling "Yes, it is I, Super-Geek the Evil Genius! Cower in disbelief at the awesome power of my Grow The Fuck Up gun! Ack-ack-ack-ack-ack-ack-ack! Take that, you monstrous munchkins!" Or maybe he could just strangle them. Just a weeny leetle bit...

The problem was, of course, that he was not actually _allowed_ into the living room. For a large part of the afternoon, Dean was apparently experiencing a protracted, difficult, and above all, loud labour (with a half-hour break for lunch, and then another break later to watch 'Batman'). Against his better judgement, and prompted by morbid curiosity, Sam had tried to check in on the boys and Castiel, but had found his way blocked.

"Medical staff only are permitted in the operating theatre and cockpit," announced Nurse Cas. The angel was wearing a dish-cloth on his head, fashioned into what could have been interpreted to be either an old-fashioned nurse's headdress, or possibly headgear from one of the more upmarket airlines flight attendant uniforms circa 1970.

"Aaaaaaaaargh!" went Dean from the sofa.

"Nurse Cas, get that man out of my operating theatre!" demanded Bobby. He had a dish-cloth of his own, tied around his face so that he looked like a very small and rather adorable train robber. "Bigfoots carry germs!"

"I'm afraid you'll have to leave," Nurse Cas insisted, "Captain Doctor Bobby is in the middle of a very delicate procedure."

"Yeeeeeeeooooooooww!" howled Dean.

"Captain Doctor Bobby?" Sam did a double take. "Captain Doctor Bobby?" He hesitated. "Did you say something about a cockpit?"

Nurse Cas nodded. "Captain Doctor Bobby, the world famous doctor, surgeon and pilot is currently with a patient, at 20,000 feet," he explained, "You will have to go to the waiting room. I will serve over-priced drinks and stale nuts later."

Sam wandered into the kitchen, feeling slightly dazed, and winced as Dean let out a particularly anguished yelp. It must be twins, he thought vaguely. He made himself a sandwich, and more coffee in a vase that was quite ugly but held more than his current mug, and headed back to his spell research.

By the time darkness and the rain had set in, he'd finalised the counter-spell, his head was aching, and his stomach was rumbling; he was thinking about dinner as Dean let out another loud wailing howl. Sam shuffled his notes, and was about to go demand that Captain Doctor Bobby give his patient a damned epidural and be done with it, when Castiel stuck his head into the study.

"Captain Doctor Bobby has asked me to inform you that you may visit the Paternity ward immediately after landing," he announced. With an inward wince, Sam headed back to the living room.

It had clearly been a complicated process; the number of kitchen utensils strewn around hinted at the complex nature of the procedure that Doctor Bobby and Nurse Cas had been forced to undertake. Mid flight. Bobby met him at the door, glaring suspiciously up at him.

"Er, I'm here to visit Dean Winchester," he said, with what he hoped was a not-too-bewildered smile, "He's, uh, just had a, um, baby. A big one, from the sound of it."

"Immediate family only," Bobby stipulated.

"I'm his uncle, that's immediate," said Sam.

"All right then," Bobby allowed grudgingly, stepping aside. "Congratulations, Mr Winchester, your nephew has had a boy."

Dean was on the sofa, sitting under the comforter, smiling widely. Jimi had a blue dish-cloth wrapped around his head like a bonnet, and was snoozing under the comforter with Dean.

"Er, congratulations, Dean," Sam stammered, as Dean nodded graciously, "He's, er, really a beautiful baby."

"His name is Jimi," Dean told him. "And it hurt like a bitch."

"Oh, er, right, yeah," nodded Sam, "I can, er, I can only imagine."

"Bobby told me how babies get out," Dean whispered confidentially, "But I think he was making that bit up. It sounded really gross."

As the boys ate their dinner – with Jimi perched on one of the kitchen chairs, because Dean refused to be separated from his 'baby' – Sam handed a note to Castiel.

"I think I've done it," he said, "There's just a couple of things I don't have here, a plant, and a tree resin; do you think you could help out?"

"I shall return tomorrow with these," Castiel told Sam, "And watch the boys while you prepare to perform the counter-spell."

"Awesome." Sam felt himself sag a little with relief. "They really are a handful like this."

"They are extremely boisterous and energetic, and the imaginative games they play are perplexing," agreed Castiel. He disappeared with a flap.

When Sam returned to the kitchen. Dean was feeding Jimi a spoonful of tuna noodle casserole. "Look Uncle Sammy!" he said brightly, "He's on solids already!"

"He's going to be some sort of child genius," predicted Captain Doctor Bobby.

Sam let out a small shriek of horror as Dean plunged the spoon back into his dinner, then shoved it into his mouth.

"This is really good!" enthused Dean, "You're a really good cook! No wonder Jimi wants to eat real food." He gave the dog another spoonful.

"Er, thanks, that's... yeah..." said Sam faintly, sitting down to his own bowl. Look on the bright side, he told himself, Dean is saying complimentary things about your cooking, and given the number of women he's swapped spit with, and the microbial flora present in the human mouth, it can't be any worse than that...

Bath time was accomplished with surprising ease that evening by the expedient of putting the dog in the bath with them. Bobby and Dean washed Jimi, while Sam washed them; Jimi gazed balefully up at him with betrayed, accusing eyes. He made sure that they were in bed, Jimi still wearing his blue baby bonnet dish-cloth, before he had his own shower (behind a carefully locked door).

Sam found himself able to relax a bit once he was in bed; Cas was on the case to get his final ingredients, the counter-spell was ready to go – within 24 hours, Bobby and Dean would be back to what passed for normal for them. No more bath time. No more Bigfoot traps. No more bouncing 150lb babies at 20,000 feet. No more witch burnings. Granted, there would still be porn magazines, but at least Dean would be of an appropriate age... the thunder storm that had been threatening earlier broke, and he rolled over under the covers, sleep beckoning...

The next flash of lightning found a way through the gap in the curtains, and illuminated three pairs of worried eyes.

"Hmmm?" he mumbled, "What's up, guys?"

"The thunder's really loud, Uncle Sammy," quavered Dean.

"It made the windows shake," said Bobby in a small voice. Jimi whined.

"Come on guys," wheedled Sam, "Aren't you a little bit old to be frightened of..."

The thunder rolled again. There were three startled yelps, then three bodies shot under the bedclothes.

Sam sighed. "Look," he began, "Thunder isn't anything to be frightened of, it's just the noise from..."

… _the rapid expansion of air in the immediated vicinity of a lightning discharge; the sudden increase in temperature and pressure drives this expansion of air, which in turn causes a sonic shock wave that produces the sound of thunder…_

"Angels," he told them. "Thunder is just the noise from angels."

Two scruffy heads appeared from under the covers on either side of him. "What are they doing up there?" asked Dean.

"They're, uh, bowling," Sam improvised shamelessly, "Yeah, the angels are bowling, and every time the ball hits the pins, we hear the noise down here as thunder."

Bobby cringed as a particularly loud peal rattled the window. "That must've been a strike," he said.

"Is it Cas bowling?" enquired Dean, his eyes wide and worried at the sound.

"Probably," Sam told him, "That was probably him, just now."

"What team does he play for?" Bobby wanted to know.

"Cas plays for the, uh, the, the Heavenly Hookers," Sam replied.

"Who are they playing against?" pressed Bobby.

"Oh, they're playing their arch rivals, the, um, the, er, the Jehovah's Clovers," Sam asserted.

"I'll bet Cas is the captain of the Hookers," stated Dean, snuggling into Sam's side, "I'll bet he's their best player, and I bet they kick the Clovers' asses."

"Why are they arch rivals?" demanded Bobby, wanting more details.

Sam sighed, and resigned himself to sharing the bed with two small boys and one very large dog for the night. "Oh, it started a very long time ago," he started, concocting his story as he went. "So long ago nobody can really remember, but some of the angels talk about one of the Jehovah's Clovers saying something rude about one of the Heavenly Hookers, then one of the Heavenly Hookers came to visit Earth, and caught a skunk, and put it in one of the Clovers' bag..."

He went on, fabricating an outlandish tale about bowling angels trash-talking and sabotaging each other. By the time he had got to the bit where Joshua threw them all out of the Garden of Eden, on account of the amount of garbage they left around the barbeque after their end-of-season celebrations, both boys were fast asleep. Dean had a handful of Sam's shirt fisted in his hand; who knew that Mr No-Chick-Flick-Moments would be such a snuggler? Sam smiled at them – asleep, they looked kind of angelic themselves. It could be an evolutionary thing, he postulated, children look cute and adorable when they go to sleep in the evening, so that after a day of driving the adults crazy, rather than strangling them, the adults go 'Awwwwww, don't they look cute, they're just adorable, tell you what, let's not strangle them after all, let's let them live for one more day'...

Then, moving carefully so as not to wake either of them, he reached for his cell, and took some pictures, because when it came to dealing with his big brother, too much blackmail material was never enough.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It wasn't the most restful night's sleep Sam had ever had; somebody chased rabbits in their dreams, twitching and panting, somebody snored, somebody make breathy whining noises, somebody drooled, somebody broke wind with astonishing ferocity, but he was unable to assign particular disturbances to the three extra lumps cuddled around him under the blankets. Still, he was relatively cheerful as he disentangled himself; today, he would finally restore Bobby and Dean to their proper ages. There would be no more bath time. No more Bigfoot traps. No more shower paranoia. No more breakfast arguments. No more cross-dressing. No more protracted mid-air labour. No more setting fire to persons or items. They could get back to arguing about normal things. Like Dean's disgusting dietary habits, frequent lack of personal grooming, unnatural attachment to his car, insistence on sharing too many details about his sexual conquests, not to mention what he would no doubt refer to as his 'adventurous nature' while Sam would refer to it as 'Dean's long list of perversions'...

"Hello Sam," said Castiel's gravelly voice from somewhere below his left ear.

"Gah!" Sam jumped in surprise. "Cas! Personal! Space!"

"My apologies," intoned the angel. "I have returned with news of the ingredients you require."

"Great!" grinned Sam, "I can make a start immediately after breakfast. Oh, Dean has so much payback coming his way..."

"I cannot obtain one of them," finished Castiel.

Sam's grin froze, then faded. "What do you mean, you can't obtain one?" he echoed.

"I cannot obtain Cry Violet," Castiel elaborated. "The plant _Viola cryana_ is extinct."

"What?" Sam's face became a picture of horrified despair. "That's a key component of the spell, it's what she used to attract men to her, to suck out their life years..."

"It was native to a very specific region of France. It was last documented in the wild in the 1930s, having died out after extensive quarrying destroyed its habitat," the angel explained, looking regretful. "It no longer exists."

"Okay," said Sam slowly, his mind racing, "Okay, so, we know when it died out, so, you do your angel mojo thing, and go back in time, say to the 1920s..."

"That will not work," the angel told him ruefully. "The plant material must be fresh, picked on the same day as the spell is worked. For occult purposes, it would be regarded as nearly a hundred years old. I am sorry, Sam."

"It's okay, Cas." Sam groaned, and sat down heavily. He dropped his head into his hands. "The genus _Viola_ must have a few hundred species in it," he mused, sounding uncertain, "Maybe I can find one that's closely related, that might work..."

"Cas!" two cheerful voices yelled, as two pairs of feet thundered down the stairs. Jimi followed them, woofing happily. "You're back!" Bobby and Dean grabbed him around the waist.

"Hello Dean, Bobby," Castiel greeted them. "Please do not sit on my feet, as I do not intend to fly away without warning. Also, please recall your Uncle Sammy's strict instructions from yesterday not to set me on fire."

"We won't," Dean assured him.

"We heard you bowling last night!" declared Bobby happily.

"Did you win?" Dean asked keenly. "I bet you did. I bet you kicked those Jehovah's Clovers' asses!"

"I think you should put another skunk in their captain's bag," snickered Bobby.

While the boys ate their breakfast – Sam insisted that Jimi was now big enough not to have to sit at the table and forbade Dean from feeding him with his spoon, although he was pretty sure that the second Sam's back was turned, boy and dog would be sharing the same cutlery – he spoke with Castiel about his next move. They stepped out of the kitchen as an animated discussion about the merits of putting pickle on pancakes, or strawberry syrup on scrambled eggs, got underway.

"Bobby has some really obscure books on herb lore," Sam ventured, sounding like he was trying to convince himself, "There might be something useful in there." He was trying not to think too hard right then about what his other options were, but they had to be faced. "Otherwise, I guess I'll have to look for a completely different spell, one that can age them forwards, but that sort of thing takes a high level practitioner. And if that doesn't work..."

"Letting nature take its course is also a viable option," Castiel pointed out gently. Sam's face drained at the thought of having to kid wrangle Dean and Bobby through childhood, and school, and oh, God, teenagerdom, he couldn't ever face having The Talk with his brother, even as a teenager, _especially_ as a teenager. Maybe he could just buy them a pet pig? It seemed to have informed Bobby as to the mechanical aspects of That Sort Of Thing...

"No," he declared firmly, starting to pace as the discussion from the kitchen moved on to the consideration of marshmallows, bacon and ice cream as a viable option for sandwich filling, "No, I'll find something. I'll start with Bobby's books. There must be something I can use instead of Cry Violet."

"It is possible," Castiel tried to encourage Sam, "This sort of occult manipulation as applied to an individual can be highly specific, customised to a particular person. The witch was several hundred years old; the spell was most likely a continuously evolving thing, changed since she first cast it. It would have been tied largely to her person and her power as much as the spell ingredients. The magic was as much in the witch as it was in the plant."

Sam stopped pacing, and turned slowly. The smile that crept across his face was bright and happy. Also a little bit sly. And a bit smug. And just the slightest bit bloodthirsty.

"Castiel," he said carefully, "I have just had an idea. It requires your assistance, but I think it might just work."

The angel cocked his head, as Sam explained what he was thinking. "Desperate situations call for desperate acts," shrugged Sam philosophically, that happy and slightly disturbing little smile still on his face. "And let's face it, I know that somebody will have my back if necessary."

"Very well," agreed Castiel eventually. The robust discussion in the kitchen was getting robuster; there was clearly disagreement about the merits of using ketchup as shampoo, as opposed to mustard. "I will be as quick as I can," the angel assured him.

Sam watched as he disappeared with a flap, then went to arbitrate the improvised shampoo dispute. He had another small charm he wanted to work before Castiel returned.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

His latest mark was taking a break when he heard the small inrush of air behind him, and turned to see a man with scruffy hair and a rumpled trench coat staring at him with a certain amount of disapproval.

"Padraig O Baile-na-carrig?" asked the stranger in a gravelly voice.

"Well, now," he replied in his lilting accent, "That's a name I haven't heard for a very long time, a very long time indeed."

"I am Castiel," the stranger went on, "An Angel of the Lord, a Warrior of Heaven. You will collect the accoutrements of your... trade," the disdain dripped from that word, "And accompany me."

He laughed. "I really don't think I have anything to offer you," he smiled, "So I'm afraid I must decline your kind invitation, as delightful as I'm sure ot would be. Now if you will excuse me, I have a customer to deal with..."

The hand that closed on his shoulder had a grip like a steel trap. Blue eyes frowned at him.

"It was not an invitation."

* * *

><p>I had to type this out twice; my wretched PC swallowed the first one. It disappeared off into the ether. It's probably demonic activity. *shakes fist* Curse you, e-demons!<p>

Reviews are the Scared-Of-Thunder Winchester With Big Appealing Eyes Of Your Choice Wanting To Hide In Your Bed With You in the Thunderstorm Of Life!


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

"I could ask why," said Sam calmly, as he tested the temperature of the water, "Because I've always been one to ask why. When things happen, I want to know the reasons behind them. But I know when I'm beat. I know that sometimes, there's not a clear answer. Life has taught me that sometimes, there is no why, there is no rhyme or reason, no logical explanation; there is just what happens, and that's an end to it. You have to accept it, and deal with it, as is." He reached for the shampoo. "So, I'm not going to ask why you decided to attempt to wash each other's hair with ketchup. Or mustard," he nodded to Dean, who stood, with a generous amount of yellow paste rubbed into his hair, sheepishly waiting for his turn. "Because I know," he turned back to Bobby, who sat on a box with his head, which was dripping ketchup, leaning back over the tub, "That even if I do, the answer I get will not make any sense. So I won't waste my breath."

"Well, ketchup and mustard are a _bit _like shampoo," Bobby offered by way of tentative explanation, "They come in a bottle, like shampoo. They're kind of thick and gloopy, like shampoo..."

"And there's lots of different kinds, like shampoo," offered Dean.

"And ladies stand in the store and look at them all and go 'Hmmmm', like shampoo," Bobby continued as Sam started to wash the red paste out of his hair.

"And it smells good, like shampoo," Dean contributed.

"And it hurts if you get it in your eyes, like shampoo," Bobby added.

"All salient points, I'm sure," nodded Sam, "Although I thought that the fact that shampoo is a detergent, a product for personal hygiene, and mustard and ketchup are condiments, flavourings to be put on food, might have been a bit of a give away?"

After he'd washed the messes they'd made out of their hair, he'd shooed them back downstairs.

"Is Cas visiting today?" asked Dean hopefully.

"Yes, Cas will be back later, with a special visitor," Sam smiled.

"Who is it?" asked Bobby eagerly.

"Ah, it's a surprise," intoned Sam portentiously. "Now, I have a little bit more to do, so I need you two to amuse yourselves. Without using mustard, ketchup, or any other edible substances as personal adornment."

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they sighed, looking slightly disappointed.

He worked on finalising one last charm, then wandered out to the living room to see if Cas had returned yet.

He hadn't.

But Dean was jumping up and down on the sofa, warbling away in an operatic fashion, like some demented bonsai Pavarotti, while Bobby air-conducted furiously.

"I'm bouncing up and do-o-o-o-o-o-wn, I'm bouncing up and do-o-o-o-o-o-wn," howled Dean, while the sofa made alarming 'spronk, spronk' noises every time he bounced, "I'm bouncing up and d-o-o-o-o-o-wn, not landing on the gro-o-o-o-o-o-o-und..."

"Guys," asked Sam, "What are you doing?"

"That's Senor Deano, the world famous trampolining opera singer," explained Bobby, gesturing to the violins for more vigour, "And I am his conductor."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Oh, for God's sake," he moaned, "There's no such thing as a trampolining opera singer!"

"Well, I've invented it," grinned Dean, not pausing in his jumping. "I'm bouncing up and do-o-o-o-o-o-o-wn, lalalalalalalaaaaaaa..."

"Stop jumping on the sofa!" demanded Sam, "It's furniture, not a trampoline! Amuse yourselves without jumping on the furniture!"

There was some mutinous muttering, but Dean hopped off the sofa. "Who died and made him the fun police?" Bobby wanted to know.

"I'm not the fun police!" protested Sam. "Look, there's all sorts of games you can play without resorting to jumping on the sofa. Games like, like..."

"Cowboys and Indians?" suggested Bobby.

"No!" Sam was emphatic. "That's not a suitable game at all!"

"We can't do Doctors and Nurses," Bobby pointed out, "We did that yesterday. And we don't have Nurse Cas here."

"Well, you can play House, you know, Mother and Father and, and, baby Jimi," Sam gestured at the dog, who sat watching the discussion with his tail wagging.

Both boys gave him such disdainful looks that he actually took a step back.

"Well, er, well, what about, what about, Cops and Robbers?" he offered. They both smiled. "Okay, then," he said, relieved, "You take turns at being the police, and don't get too noisy. And no police brutality."

"Yes, Uncle Sammy," they agreed with worryingly compliant smiles. He left them to it, one ear out for the tell-tale flapping of incoming trench-coat.

When he next ventured out of the study, he heard an intriguing complaint from the living room: "But I didn't _do_ anything!" He peeked in.

Dean was wearing the ancestor of what would, about ten years later, turn into his 'I'm Too Sexy To Arrest' expression.

Bobby stood over him, wearing what looked alarmingly like a mop head on his head. He was frowning at Dean, pulling his mouth into a grimace that suggested he'd just sucked on a lemon.

"You're having fun," Bobby accused him, "And that's not allowed."

"Says who?" demanded Dean. "Who the hell are you?"

"I am Officer Uncle Sammy, of the Fun Police," stated Bobby sternly, making his mouth do the lemon-sucking thing again, "And I have detected you having fun. See this?" He pointed to his own lemon-sucking expression. "This is my fun detection bitchface. It goes like this in the presence of fun."

"You made a mistake, officer!" cried Dean, his most wistful big green eyes expression showing.

"No I haven't. I am highly trained to detect fun. Also, my fun detection sniffer dog detected you." Jimi whuffed, and wagged his tail. "See? He's detected fun."

"This isn't fair," humphed Dean, "I want to speak to your superior officer!"

"There is no officer more superior than me," smirked Bobby, "I am the most senior member of the Fun Police in the entire world. And you, mister, are under arrest for having fun!"

"No! No! I want a lawyer!" yelped Dean.

"You're so obviously guilty, there's no point," Bobby decided, fun-detection-bitchface getting even lemonier, "So I'm taking you to fun jail."

"I don't want to go to fun jail!" wailed Dean. "I promise I'll be good, Officer Uncle Sammy, and not have any fun!"

"That's what they all say," sneered Bobby, "Now, off to fun jail with you, where you will have to eat oatmeal for breakfast everyday."

"Nooooooo!" moaned Dean.

"Yes. And you get broccoli with dinner every night."

"Have mercy!" Dean fell to his knees.

"Nope. And you have to have a bath. Twice a day. With soap, and everything."

"Aaaaaaaaaargh!" Dean clutched Bobby around the knees. "Please, please, please don't take me to fun jail, Officer Uncle Sammy, it sounds awful..."

Bobby seemed to reconsider. "Well," he said slowly, mouth puckering in disapproval, "If you promise not to have any more fun..."

"I promise, I promise!" said Dean fervently.

"Okay, then, I sentence you to watch a show on the National Geographic channel," intoned Bobby, with the demeanour of a hanging judge, "And learn stuff. And it's not allowed to be one with African ladies living in the desert, because you just want to look at their boobies."

"There's nothing wrong with African ladies," muttered Dean, "They're pretty, too."

"Nope, it has to be educational," stipulated Bobby, "No boobies."

Sam dropped into a kitchen chair, and let his head fall to the table. He wondered if this is what it was really like to have kids. He wondered why anyone ever had more than one kid. He wondered why more children weren't murdered. He wondered if he really pulled a face like that when he was annoyed. Dean just teased him about the bitchface thing, right? He didn't _really_ look like he'd just bitten a lemon, did he?...

_flap-flap_

"Hello, Sam."

Sam didn't even try to stifle the sigh of relief that escaped him when he lifted his eyes and saw Castiel, accompanied by the slightly shell-shocked dark-haired man who was clutching a small wooden case to his chest.

He was across the room in two steps, pulling the bewildered man into a hug.

"Oh, Patrick!" he said with a deep sigh, "You have no idea how good it is to see you again!"

"Yeep!" went Patrick.

"Oh, sorry, too tight?" grinned Sam, stepping back. "Come on," he continued, "There's a couple of people I want you to meet."

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

Patrick was rattled. He would admit it. It took a lot to rattle him; in 900 years, he had seen a lot of things, but this, this took the cake.

First, an untidy-looking man had appeared in the back room he was using, in the middle of a poker game, and announced himself as an angel. Then, he had insisted that Patrick gather his chips and cards, and 'accompany' him. Patrick had laughed, wondering how the kook with religious mania had gotten in unannounced, but then the kook had grabbed him, and a terrifying aura of power beyond anything he could ever hope to achieve had radiated menacingly from him, and he'd grabbed his things, then the weirdo had grabbed him, then there was a flapping noise, and the world lurched sideways...

Then he was no longer _there_, but was suddenly _here_, his head spinning and his stomach roiling. 'Here' was a kitchen, currently occupied by a man whose expression suggested that he had recently peered into the jaws of Chaos and barely escaped with his sanity...

_Hunter_, his intuition screamed loud and clear, but before his rattled brain could react, the man – oh dear, the giant man – was on him, and hugging him, and he knew he'd seen this guy before, and it meant trouble...

"Wait!" he yelped. The tall man stopped. "Er," he went on, "Er, do you think you could... I've met you before, haven't I?" His mind finally supplied a name. "It's... Winchester. Sam Winchester, right?"

"Oh, I'm glad you remember," Sam gave him a smile that had a hint of demented mania to it, "You remember my brother, then? Dean? And our friend, Bobby?"

"Er, yes, yes, I do," Patrick smiled a little to cover his own desperately churning thoughts, _What the fuck is going on here?_ "Um, look, Sam, I can't help but noticing, one moment I was in the middle of a game, and the next, your, er, friend here..."

"I am Castiel, an Angel of the Lord," repeated Castiel.

"Yes, er, your friend Castiel, the Angel of the Lord..."

"And a Warrior of Heaven," added Sam.

"Yes, yes, quite, and a Warrior of Heaven, the point is, one moment I was there, and now I'm... here." He paused. "I would quite like to know why."

Sam clapped his hands together briskly. "Well, Patrick," he said, "I need your help. I need your peculiar and specific talents with a little problem I have."

Patrick's face hardened. "I'm hardly going to offer help to a Hunter who once tried to kill me, after he's had me abducted..."

"Oh, Patrick, don't be like that," said Sam, turning on the puppy-dog eyes, "Look, just come through and meet Bobby and Dean, and I'll show you what the problem is."

"I'm not going to help you," snapped Patrick.

"Oh, I think you'll find that you are," smiled Sam serenely, as he hustled the he-witch through to the living room.

Bobby and Dean had swapped roles: Dean was wearing the mop head wig, and Bobby was begging not to be sent to fun jail.

"And your eggs will be cooked poached," announced Dean grimly, while Bobby grovelled and pleaded, "And you have to be in the choir forever..."

"Boys, our visitor is here!" Sam called cheerfully. They broke off their game, and came running. "Dean, Bobby," he nodded to them, "You probably don't remember him, but this is Patrick. He's a... friend."

"I'd hardly describe you as a friend, Sam," sniffed Patrick. Sam laughed hugely, and clapped him on the shoulder.

"Patrick, you once gave me a sexually transmitted disease," he said, "Most people would conclude that, at least at some point, we were very friendly indeed." He turned back to the boys. "Patrick here has come to visit today," he told them, "For the very purpose of meeting you two, and playing with you!"

"What?" gasped Patrick, eyes going wide.

"Yaaaaay!" cheered Dean and Bobby.

"No I'm not!" declared Patrick.

"Yes, you are," Sam assured him.

"No, I'm not!" Patrick reiterated.

"Yes, you are," Castiel rumbled dangerously behind him.

"Oh," said Sam, in a disappointed voice, "It looks like he might be changing his mind..."

Bobby and Dean scrambled into action.

"What the?..." Patrick looked down in confusion. "Get off my feet, you pair of eejits!" They just giggled at him. He tried ineffectually to shuffle his feet. "Get off! Get them off!" his voice became more strident.

"Okay, guys, he's not going to escape," Sam assured them, "Just go back to your game, while I talk to Patrick in the study. Then, he'll come out and play with you!"

"Yaaaaay!" cheered the boys again. Patrick let himself be hustled away, not entirely unhappy at escaping the two hellions who'd sat on his feet.

"Look," he said, once he was in the study with Sam, "I don't know what sort of curse has done this to them, but I'm not..."

Sam hit him. It was an open-handed slap, but Sam was a big guy, and it hurt.

"Shut up, he-witch," he said calmly, "Shut up, and listen, or I will hit you again."

"Now just a minute..."

Sam hit him again.

"Ow!" Patrick picked himself up off the floor, glaring at Sam. "All right then, what?"

"Patrick, I have had a very bad week," Sam sighed, smiling a little despairingly at him, "Dean and I found a witch who was doing a very similar thing to what you do; she booby-trapped her grimoire. Dean triggered it, which turned Bobby into a seven-year-old. Then Bobby triggered it, turning Dean into a seven-year-old." He picked up an ancient-looking book. "And since then, I have been having a very, very bad week. I have had those two driving me nuts. They are noisy. They are boisterous. And they are very difficult to bathe. They cannot be left alone for more than five minutes without getting into mischief."

Patrick recognised a certain amount of crazed desperation in Sam's eyes. He'd seen plenty of desperation before; he knew he was looking at a man very close to snapping. "Just when I think they can't get into any more trouble, they do. Then, when I finally figure out how to undo the spell, I discover that one of the key requirements is a plant that is now extinct. And then, I remembered you." He smiled. It was smile that made Patrick think of a lion looking at a small, newborn gazelle with a broken leg. "So, I asked my friend, Cas, to find you, and bring you here. Now, here you are. You are going to play poker with Dean and Bobby. And they are going to lose, until they get back to their proper ages."

Patrick regarded him squarely. "Sam, as intriguing as the idea is, if a Hunter – one who has tried to kill me, might I reiterate – has gone and gotten himself cursed, then it's not my problem." He squared up to the bigger man. "I suggest you don't hit me again. I may not be able to outrun an angel, but I can sure as hell make you wish you'd never tried to track me down..."

His voice stuttered to a halt. Sam had his hands to his face, and his shoulders were shaking.

Sam was laughing at him.

"Let me just be clear with you, little he-witch," he said softly, still chuckling, "I will do whatever I have to, in order to fix what has happened to my brother, and my friend. If it is within my power to arrange I will do it." He fixed Patrick with that slightly disturbing sunny smile. "I have faced down demons. I have faced down a Horseman of the Apocalypse. I have faced down Lucifer, Patrick, faced him down, taken control from him, and thrown him back into his cage. And I have bathed two seven year olds – at once. Do you really think you can say or do anything that will threaten me?"

Patrick gulped.

"Might I also add," Sam went on more pleasantly, "That my dog happens to be half-Hellhound. He has what Dean calls 'a nose for evil shit'. That's the Hellhound bit. He's also terribly protective of his Pack. That's the Rottweiler bit. Guess which bit you're on the brink of triggering?"

Patrick heard a low, rumbling growl behind him. He turned to see a very large dog sitting in the doorway, and his eyes widened. The dog's eyes were glowing hotly red, and his hellteeth bristled from his mouth like a butcher's knives.

"Further," Sam went on, "If you don't do what I ask, I will do this." He picked up the spell book, and, smiling happily, opened it at Patrick.

There was a brief flash of blue light...

Patrick _felt_ the years sucked away from him. He knew the sensation – after all, he did lose sometimes; once or twice he'd lost big, fifty or sixty years in a hit, and he still remembered the yanking sensation of paying up. This thing whipped at least a century away from him, and Sam had barely separated the pages. A few more bursts of that, and all 900 years would catch up with him at once...

"And, just in case you are still thinking of not co-operating," Sam went on happily as Patrick stared in horror at the book, "You better know that I have back-up." He cleared his throat. "Help help help!" he called melodramatically, "Oh, who will help a poor endangered Bigfoot in his time of peril?"

With a raucous war-cry, the two small boys burst into the room. Patrick's eyes bugged in bewilderment. One was wearing underwear on his head, one was wearing a truly terrifying bra, and the Angel of the Lord, or God, what he was wearing, it didn't bear thinking about...

"Bla-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a!" went one boy, whizzing an egg beater at him, "Taste death from my atomic death ray gun!"

"Boobi-da-boobi-da-boobi-da!" The other boy waggled the awful bra at him.

The Angel of the Lord did something so dreadful that Patrick found himself clutching at the wall for support. "Please now imagine that you are undergoing painful molecular disintegration under the lasers firing from my Tassels Of Doom," he intoned seriously.

"I think I should warn you," Sam told him in a confidential manner, "That the Underwear Avengers know how to deal with evil witches."

"Boobi-da-boobi-da-boo... is he a witch?" Dean stopped mid salvo. Patrick gawped at him.

"Go on," prompted Sam, "Answer Braboy. Before he shoots you with his boobie cannon again."

"Er, yes... Dean," Patrick managed to stutter out, "You probably don't remember the last time we met, but, yes, I am a witch. Or a warlock, if you prefer."

"We know how to deal with witches," Bobby stopped whizzing the egg beater. "Are you an evil witch?"

"He might be," hinted Sam knowingly, "If he doesn't want to play with you, I'd say that would make him pretty evil. Who wouldn't want to play with two such adorable, cheeky little cherubs?"

Bobby looked suddenly eager. "Does that mean," he breathed in wonder, "Does that mean... we can set him on fire?"

"That's what we do with evil witches," confirmed Dean, grinning hugely. "We've had _practice_," he told Patrick archly.

Patrick looked from Sam to Castiel. "You cannot be serious," he spluttered, "You cannot possibly condone that!"

"You are an abomination, damned by your own conduct," Castiel told him reprovingly, "If it was not within your power to assist Sam, I would smite you myself. I would certainly have no qualms in assisting them to incinerate you."

Patrick considered his options. Throwing a spell at the man who defeated Lucifer, an Angel whose aura of energy made him feel like a battery next to a nuclear power plant, a Hellbred dog that was barely restraining itself from tearing him limb from limb, or two children who were entirely sincere in their resolve to set him on fire – none of these seemed like terribly good ideas.

He sighed. Life was like that. He had survived as long as he had by knowing when to hold 'em, and knowing when to fold 'em. Some days you were the pigeon. Other days, you were the statue.

"So, then, boys," he smiled cheerfully at them, "Do you know how to play poker?"

* * *

><p>Some of the Denizens seem to think that the DDD&amp;SSS (in their guise of Denizens' Dean Destressing &amp; Sam Soothing Service) should be summoned. Any applicants to be Dean Destressers or Sam Soothers? No previous experience necessary, although some familiarity with chocolate would be an advantage.<p>

_Have your Winchesters been stressed out by an evil witch's spell?_  
><em>Have they been reduced to children or had life made living hell?<br>__Call DDD&SSS to soothe and treat and spoil,  
><em>_We're local and we're mobile and we'll bring the massage oil._

Reviews are the Twirling Tassels on the Corset Of Life!


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

"So, then," Patrick made himself smile at the two young, eager faces sitting at the other side of the table, "You know how to play poker, then?" Both boys nodded.

"Oh yes, my Daddy taught me," chirped Dean.

"And Dean taught me," said Bobby proudly. "He showed me how to make pairs, and stuff. I won some matches!"

"Well, that's... that's wonderful," he said, shuffling his cards. "Now, today, we're going to play for chips."

"Like potato chips?" asked Dean hopefully.

"No, they're just called chips," Patrick smiled nervously, glancing at Sam, who sat watching. Every now and then, he waggled a Zippo meaningfully. "They're like pretend money. So, it's just like playing for matches." He counted out chips, and immediately hit a problem.

"How come Bobby gets more chips than me?" asked Dean plaintively.

"Well," Patrick grinned desperately, "That's because... that's because... it's because..."

Sam waggled the lighter again.

Patrick swallowed. "It's because Bobby learned from you, so he hasn't had as much practice," he improvised. Dean wasn't happy, casting him a betrayed look, but he didn't say anything further. Patrick sighed, and dealt the cards.

It was, well, it was like playing cards with two seven-year-olds. And Patrick found that he hated it. There was no joy in it; he knew that they were Hunters, but like this... it was worse than shooting fish in a barrel. It was shooting fish on the lawn.

They were clearly on their best behaviour for a visitor. The said 'please' and 'thank you' when he dealt cards, and even congratulated him on particularly good hands, beaming and chattering with excitement when he put together a Royal Flush and seriously depleted their chips. Dean couldn't keep the sunny smile off his face when he held a good hand; Bobby got confused with 'flush' and 'straight', and sometimes showed his cards to Dean for advice.

"Mr Patrick, if I've almost got a Royal Flush, but I need the ace for it, should I throw away the nine, or hang onto it?" Dean asked him seriously.

Patrick coughed. "Er, well," he began, "A straight flush is a really good hand, Dean, only a Royal Flush can beat it..." he sighed. "But, if you throw away your nine, you might get the ace."

"Okay, I'll have one, please," Dean told him happily, throwing away one card. His face fell when he looked at his new card. But he smiled pleasantly when Patrick won again.

"Oh, I thought I might win," said Bobby with a sigh, "Look, I had three sixes!"

"Never mind, Bobby," Dean consoled him, "It's only a game. We're having fun, aren't we?"

"Yeah," agreed Bobby, with a big smile, "We are! You're a real good card player, Mr Patrick!"

Their happy ignorance and good sportsmanship made him feel like an A-grade bastard.

_Waggle-waggle, _went Sam behind them...

"Of course we are," he made himself smile, "It's not often that I get to play with such polite opponents who are such good sports."

They smiled and giggled, adorable and cute and guileless. "Deal, deal, deal!" they sang.

Finally, he was in a position to clean them out. He watched as Dean frowned in disappointment at his cards. Bobby wrinkled his nose adorably in confusion, and showed his hand to Dean, who shrugged, at a loss, as they whispered together. Then, getting a determined look on his face, Bobby turned a cheeky, defiant grin to the warlock.

"I raise," he said, and Patrick was convinced the universe was punishing him for the misdeeds of his life.

The stakes went up again, and again; Dean ran out of chips, and folded. Bobby looked undecided and lost, then smiled uncertainly, and pushed his last chips into the pot.

Thank God, thought Patrick, it was over. "Three of a kind," he lay down his cards.

Bobby's face went through the floor. "Oh," he said quietly.

"What do you have, Bobby?" asked Dean encouragingly.

"Two pair," Bobby replied. "Three of a kind beats two pair, doesn't it, Mr Patrick?"

"Yes, Bobby, I'm afraid it does," Patrick replied gently, reaching for the chips.

"Yep," sighed Bobby, "All I got is two pair." He laid down his cards. "Two red nines. And two black nines."

The look the two kids shot him was pure evil. He sat stunned as they high-fived. Sam dropped the lighter.

"You owned him, Bobby!" crowed Dean, "You totally owned his ass!"

"That look always works on the Widder O'Brien," Bobby chuckled, racking in his winnings, "I only gotta turn on the 'adorable little urchin' expression, and she's takin' down the cookie jar..."

"Patrick," rumbled Sam dangerously, "Did you just get played by two seven-year-olds?"

Patrick felt his jaw working, but no sound came out. "Er," he managed. "I may find myself temporarily in a position of being not poised for absolutely imminent victory..."

"You are supposed to beat them!" hissed Sam.

"I was!" Patrick hissed back. "I was! They could barely play..."

"Shows how much adults know," tittered Dean.

"Yeah, they always assume kids are dumb, just because we're little," agreed Bobby. "There's a word for it. It's a big word. It's con... con... condimenting..."

"Condescension," snapped Sam. "Condimenting is what you did to each other this morning. Hey, what are you doing?"

"Sharing," replied Bobby, as he divided the chips into two piles. "Dean lost all his chips, so I'm giving him some of mine."

"You can't do that!" Sam yelped.

"I'm afraid they can," Patrick informed him nervously, "Nowhere in the rules does it prohibit donation of chips to another player. I thought you'd be pleased with that, sharing like well-behaved boys," he sniped, unable to help himself. "You have taught them well..."

"Shut up and start winning," Sam growled, "Or I will set fire to you myself."

"Oh, great, no pressure, then," griped Patrick, dealing the cards. The demeanour of the two boys before him had changed completely. Their faces were shuttered, and they took their cards silently.

Patrick sighed inwardly. He knew it; the universe was punishing him.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It didn't get any better. Maybe because they didn't know they were playing for years of their lives, they didn't get as stressed out as most of his customers did. Or maybe the little bastards just were as cunning as shit-house rats. Bobby had an unnatural head for considering odds, and Dean had a poker face that would make a rock seem hysterically melodramatic. The game swung back and forth; just when he thought he was poised to clean at least one of them out, the little wretch would lay down a carefully constructed, crushing hand. When he did finally manage to construct a Royal Flush, they folded! The vicious, scheming little eejits folded! He couldn't stop the small yelp of exasperation that escaped from him.

Sam had moved on to flicking the lighter intermittently, and giving Patrick what the witch could only think of as _heated_ looks...

"Goodness me, look at the time," he tweeted cheerfully, "My word, I'm hungry. What do you say, we have a break, for a snack?"

Deam and Bobby exchanged a knowing look, and a mutual smirk. "Sure, Mr Patrick," Bobby generously, "A break would be good. Can we have some cookies, please, Uncle Sammy?" He turned his Widder O'Brien expression on.

Sam gave him a forced grin. "Sure, just don't eat enough to get sick," he stipulated. With whoops of joy, they bolted for the kitchen.

Sam rounded on Patrick. "What the hell are you playing at?" he demanded. "Just beat them already!"

"I'm trying!" Patrick insisted, "But they are actually talented. Sam, they are just naturally good at this! My God, man, do you realise how much money you could make with them like this? There are junior poker tournaments. And that Bobby, I could teach him a thing or two, he clearly has occult aptitude, if you'd just let me train him for a few years..."

"You should have cleaned them out by now!" Sam insisted.

"Funnily enough, I find I'm being distracted," said Patrick sourly, "By somebody, sitting over there, flicking a lighter, just to remind me that he is completely comfortable with the concept of me being set on fire. I can't think why that would ever put me off my game..."

"Then, cheat!" Sam told him. "Deal a crooked deck! We've got a deck of marked cards. Use your mojo! The magic's in the 900 year old witch, remember? Rig the game!"

"I can't," Patrick complained, "One of the conditions is that I have to play a straight game. Usually, the people I play are so jittery about playing for their lives, literally, that I can rely on them to make silly mistakes! These two are having fun! The evil, calculating, manipulative little buggers are killing me here, and they're enjoying it, they're smiling while they do it!" He scowled. "And to think I started off feeling bad for playing them..."

Sam huffed bad-temperedly, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "All right," he said with determination, "All right. We'll fix this." He gave the lighter to Castiel, and spoke briefly with the angel, who had remained in the corner, watching proceedings.

When the boys returned from the kitchen, he sat down at the table with them.

"Guess what boys?" Patrick trilled with what he hoped was enthusiasm, "Your Uncle Sammy is going to play with us! Won't that be fun?"

"Yaaaaay!" cheered Bobby and Dean, climbing back onto their chairs.

Sam took ten years, and smiled – no, he bared his teeth – at Patrick. "Deal," he instructed.

In the corner, Castiel cleared his throat discreetly. Then waggled the lighter at Patrick.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

It was easier after that. Patrick altered his game plan from 'Win' to 'Only Lose To Sam'. It seemed to work. Dean was sneaky, Bobby was rat cunning, but Sam had been doing this for a lot longer. Castiel and his incendiary witch motivation device helped enormously in devising his reformulated strategy.

Eventually, after another break for lunch, and a short interval so the boys could watch 'Batman' again, Dean lost the last of his chips. He shrugged philosophically, and joined Bobby. They were harder to beat as a team, but in the end, they lost Bobby's chips, too.

Sam visibly sagged with relief. "Ugh, finally," he groaned, putting down his cards and stretching, "Oh, God, I just want this to be over. Here," he carelessly pushed the large pile of chips in front of him into the pot, "I'll see you."

Patrick smiled, also relieved the game was over. "I can't say I blame you for wanting to end this quickly," he sympathised, laying down a full house. "So, you get what you want, and I get eighty-odd years for my trouble. I won't say it's been a pleasure meeting you again, but..."

Sam put down his cards. Four of a kind. Patrick's face drained as Sam pulled the disturbingly large pile of chips towards himself, and started to count them out.

"Yeah, I'm really glad this game is over," grinned Sam as he counted. Patrick gulped. He'd been idly keeping a mental tab on the pot; he didn't know exactly how much was there, but given the grimoire flash Sam had already given him, he was pretty sure that, if he wanted to, Sam could cash in enough chips to wipe him out of existence.

His train of thought must've shown on his face, because Sam winked at him. "Nah, that wouldn't be very sporting of me, would it?" he said airily, "Tell you what, why don't I leave this on my tab? I know you're good for it, any time I care to claim. Only, I might not. Unless I hear of you playing poker for people's lives, of course, I don't approve of that, and if I ever find out that you're doing it again, I might have to track you down, and call in my debt."

Patrick considered his words. "It won't stop me," he said, finally, "Not for certain. The minute you're dead, I can start again. All I have to do is outlive you. And Hunters have a tendency to die young, whereas I have a tendency to survive."

"Yeah, that's true," Sam conceded, "But it means that you won't be sucking people's lives away on my watch. And who knows; I might get lucky, and you might get Alzheimer's." He grinned infuriatingly, then called the two boys, who had begun bouncing on the sofa again. "Dean, Bobby," he called, "Mr Patrick has to go now, come and say goodbye."

"Goodbye, Mr Patrick," said Bobby, "It was fun beating you."

"Goodbye, Mr Patrick, echoed Dean, "Maybe we can meet up some other time, and me and Bobby can set you on fire then."

"Goodbye, boys," Patrick tried to smile, "It's been... educational."

Sam nodded to Castiel, who stepped forward from the corner. "Here's your AngelAir flight," Sam told him. "Oh, before you go, I have something for you, just a little something for your trouble..." Sam handed Patrick a packet of laxative tablets, and a small carefully wrapped gift box. "You're going to need those," Sam confirmed at the witch's questioning look, "And I suggest that you eat a sensible wholegrain cereal for breakfast for at least a week."

"Er... all right. Goodbye Sam." Patrick didn't offer to shake hands. "I hope I never see your smiling, scheming face again."

"Likewise, assbutt," Sam grinned with a cheerful wave.

Castiel stepped in front of him, and Patrick felt the world go _whoosh _sideways again...

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

... Then he was back in the warehouse where he'd been running his game.

"Well, that was... interesting," he mumbled. He didn't feel well. He wasn't sure whether it was the AngelAir flight, or the idea of Sam Winchester holding a fatal tab on him, or just being screwed over by two seven year olds, but his head ached, his stomach hurt, his guts gurgled alarmingly, and, well, he had suddenly noticed a most uncomfortable burning sensation in his groin...

Thoughtfully, he opened the small gift box that Sam has given him, then groaned out loud. Inside the box was a roofing nail.

Sam had given him a nail.

He was willing to bet it was gonorrhoea. Well played, Mr Winchester, well played...

With a start, he realised that the angel, Castiel, was still standing behind him, and was staring at him. "Is there something I can do for you, Mr Angel?" he asked tartly, trying not to rub at his crotch – it had been a trying day, and he should probably go and see a doctor. "Need your harp tuned? Halo polished? Robe dry cleaned, perhaps?"

Castiel stepped into his personal space. "I would have preferred to smite you where you stand," he growled in that gravelly monotone, "You are an evil, immoral sinner. You have damned yourself, and the Pit cannot receive you soon enough."

"Well, why don't you, then?" demanded Patrick, thoroughly piqued by the day's events, "Why don't you just smite me yourself, and be done with it?"

The angel offered him an almost smile that was, in its own way, so much more disturbing that the crazed grin Sam had shown him. It was old, and it was knowing, and it was terrifying.

"Because," the angel told him quietly, "I can read your twisted, corrupted fate on your blackened soul, and see that it is not for me to separate it from your defiled, worthless body."

Patrick gazed levelly at the angel. "Can you see my death, then?" he asked more bravely than he felt.

The angel gave him that almost-smile again. "Yes," he replied. "You will die at the hands of the Winchesters. I will not deprive them of that... satisfaction."

Patrick sighed. "Sam and Dean will collect on my debt, then," he mused. "Figures."

"They will not," Castiel told him, "Sam has too well developed a sense of... fair play. You will keep your end of the bargain, and you will never meet them again."

Patrick's face crinkled in confusion. "But you just said..."

The angel actually gave him a real, radiant smile, and it was possibly the scariest thing Patrick had ever seen.

"I never said it would be Sam and Dean," he positively smirked as he disappeared.

* * *

><p>I really didn't think Patrick got enough of a comeuppance first time around. 'To give someone a nail' is an older slang term for giving someone a sexually transmitted disease. Patrick would definitely understand the pun, because it's thought to be derived from the Irish gaelic word <em>ainfheoil, <em>which is pronounced 'a nail', and means corrupt flesh, granulations, or a sexually transmitted disease. Sam is such a clever boy.

Reviews are the Delicious Cookies out of the Big Jar Of Life! *makes adorably appealing and wistful Widder O'Brien expression*


	18. Chapter 18

OMGWTFBBQ! I am super-duper excited that one of my stories has cracked 200 reviews! *bounces on couch excitedly* I can only thank the Denizens, Visitors, Lurkers and Casual Droppers-In of the Jimiverse for taking the time to offer encouragement. It's pathetic how happy your reviews make me. Utterly pathetic.

Oh, crud, me and my throw-away lines. I'll never learn. I should; the last time I dropped one, I ended up having to write an entire story about how Ronnie met Andrew...

Dean and Sam may have been living as old men at Singer Salvage in 'F**k My Afterlife', but that doesn't preclude them having kids. Look at the record of what tends to happen to the wimmenfolk who get too up close and personal with the Winchesters. They have an alarming tendency to end up dead. They're only in their 30s here, so there's plenty of time for them to meet, breed with, and lose A Special Lady. I really don't think I'm the one to write that story; I'm just saying that, in the Jimiverse, it is entirely possible that either one or both of them went down that leg of the Trousers Of Time (being possible branching points in history, as explained by the esteemed Terry Pratchett esq.).

Maybe, down one leg, it went like this...

The beginning of the end of Patrick the witch started on a Hunt. (Doesn't it always start with a Hunt?) Dean and RJ (Robert John) were after a shapeshifter in Nebraska. The damned thing was old, and cunning, and strong, and frigging fast... Dean and RJ became separated, and it just about got the drop on RJ when something else ploughed into it. RJ turned around just in time to see... a werewolf. He was loaded with silver for the shifter, though, so he tried to put a round into it, but as he did, another werewolf came out of nowhere, pushed the first one – a juvenile, he could see by comparison with the adult that appeared – out of the way, and took the round. Dean followed the gunshots, and arrived just in time to see RJ, standing bewildered and out of silver ammo, being yapped at irritably by the adult wolf, while the juvenile managed to look embarrassed. Dean lined up a shot to kill it, then the adult jumped across the clearing, snarling, and the next thing he knew, there was a rude tattooed nude sitting on his chest, bleeding on one of his favourite shirts, yelling in his face, "Dean Fucking Winchester, you harm a hair on my pup's head and I will personally feed you your own bloody kidneys!"

Well, after that, of course, it was gabba gabba hey, and shrill arguing, while Sabine shifted back to human, and said to RJ apologetically, "I'm sorry about her, she gets ridiculously protective sometimes."

"Yeah, Dad can be the same," mumbled RJ, face going red and looking everywhere except the naked girl his own age in front of him. "Um, thanks for stopping the shifter. I'm sorry for trying to shoot you, you kind of, you know, surprised me. Er."

"It's okay," said Sabine, "Hunters do that sometimes. Mum is going to tear me a new one for not keeping out of the way."

Then they stood around being embarrassed by their parents, because that's what teenagers have been doing since teenagers were invented, and RJ gave Sabine his overshirt, and they ended up pulling Ronnie and Dean apart, and then it was all "Your thug of a son tried to kill my daughter" and "Your harridan of a daughter tried to kill my son" and "You are not to have anything to do with that idiot Winchester boy," and "You will never speak to that Jaeger girl ever again" and "So, can I call you?" and "Sure. Really, I'm sorry about Mum" and Uncle Sam was a co-conspirator and it all went a bit hormonal from there – there were Cupids involved – and a number of years later, they found out just how much they had in common, and Dean and Ronnie had calmed down a bit by then, and even managed to get all the way through the reception without shooting each other and even co-ordinated their efforts to train up RJ and Sabine's twins when the boys showed an aptitude and desire to learn to Hunt.

It was some thirty years after that, when their grandparents were dead, that Sam and Ian caught up with Patrick, and watched him crumble away under the effects of his own spell turned back against him. They weren't sure what to do about his grimoire, because it was a dangerously powerful artefact, but their dog, Chevy, who was only six months old at the time, dealt with the problem by chewing it up and eating it, a tendency to defuse dangerous occult objects by swallowing them being a trait peculiar to that particular branch of the bloodline descended from their grandfather's first dog, Jimi.

...Or maybe it didn't. But it might have.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 18<strong>

_spronk spronk spronk_

"I'm bouncing up and down, I'm bouncing up and down, tra-la-la-la-laaaaa..."

"Okay guys," sighed Sam, watching Bobby and Dean boinging up and down on the long-suffering sofa once more, "Time to stop bouncing, go upstairs and change."

Bobby jumped from the sofa, and gave Sam a puzzled look. "Why do we have to get changed?" he asked, confused, "We're not dirty."

"Just, look, just trust me on this one, you really should go upstairs, then change your clothes," Sam insisted. "If you do this, I'll get pizza for dinner." Bobby looked at him dubiously, his expression clearly signalling that he believed that Uncle Sammy had finally lost the marbles he'd been clutching at so desperately for days now, but shrugged, and headed upstairs. "You too, Senor Deano."

"I'm bouncing up and do-o-o-o-o-wn, dooby dooby doo... Bobby's right, I don't need to change," complained Dean, still jumping.

"Yes, you do," Sam told him, "You really need to go upstairs to change."

"No I don't," smirked Dean.

"Yes you do," countered Sam.

"No I don't," Dean continued to jump.

"Take pity on the poor sofa," wheedled Sam, "It's had a hard life already, and I think I can hear it groaning."

"Get a new one, then," said Dean airily, "And I'll jump on that one too."

"Dean, I am warning you," Sam narrowed his eyes, "If you don't stop jumping and go upstairs right now... I'll take your picture."

"See if I care!" Dean stuck his fingers in the corner of his mouth, and stuck out his tongue. "Blaaaaah! I'll break your phone, blaaaaaah!"

With a knowing smirk, Sam took out his cell. Any moment now... "Okay," he said, "Don't say I didn't warn you..."

"Blaaaah!" Dean continued to pull faces. "Blaaaaah! Blaaaaa..."

There was a strange, disconcerting moment, accompanied by the ripping of fabric, when reality went _glerp_...

"...aaaaaaa oooooooo OOOOOOOOHSHIT!"

_click_

"I did warn you, bro," Sam said matter-of-factly, watching the extremely interesting series of expressions play across his brother's face.

_spronk spronk sproingggggg_

Objecting to having a fully grown adult male jumping on it, the sofa ejected Dean. He landed sprawled on the floor, as a shout of "God's tits!" drifted down from upstairs.

"Saaaam! Saaaaam! SAAAAAAAAM!" warbled Dean, his brain catching up with the happenings of the previous few days. "SAAAAAAM!" Oh, and the fact that he was standing in Bobby's living room with no clothes on. "_SAAAAAAAAM!"_

"No pizza for you, bro," scolded Sam, laughing as his brother looked around frantically for something to cover himself with. "SAAAAAAAM!" He settled for a cushion. "SAAAAAAAM! Bath! Bra! Bigfoot! Spoon! Hairy! Mustard! Bed! Cas! Corset! Corset! Cas! Tassels! Tassels, Sam, tassels! Witch! Poker! Sofa! Naked! SAAAAAAAAM!" Dean looked around wildly again, then ran for the stairs.

"And watch out for Bigfoot traps!" Sam called after him, grinning. He checked his phone. He'd captured the moment perfectly: his brother, his adult brother, jumping on the sofa, pulling a face. Stark naked. Pure, unalloyed, unadulterated blackmail gold.

**...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... **

"And this one is you guys asleep with Cas reading you the Bible..." Sam described the pictures as they flashed onto the laptop screen.

"You could sell that one to Hallmark," declared Bobby, "If you just photoshop some wings in on Feathers, there. The 'Guardian Angel On Duty' expression is perfect."

"I hate you so much," muttered Dean.

"...And this one is you guys in the bath, washing Jimi..."

"Ma always did say I was a cute kid," grinned Bobby.

"There's a word for people who take pictures of kids with no clothes on," rumbled Dean grumpily.

"...And this one is you guys when you insisted on invading the bed because the thunder was scaring you..."

"Bowling angels!" chuckled Bobby, shaking his head. "Never heard that one before; Grandma used to say it was angels prowling around, looking for naughty children to report to God."

"I am totally not cuddling up to you," declared Dean.

"...And this one is the Underwear Avengers..."

"That's not the first time I've seen the twirling tassels thing, you know," said Bobby thoughtfully.

"No, me either," Dean grated out, "But every other time, it's been a chick doing the twirling."

"...And this," grinned Sam, "Is why you should go upstairs to change when you're told..."

"Hey!" Dean reached out and tried to slam the laptop shut. "That is so wrong! It takes a special kind of weirdo to take a picture of a man when he's jumping on a sofa, and through no fault of his own, happens to have ended up naked..."

"Says the guy who snuck into the bathroom to check out my junk," observed Sam tartly, deftly pulling the laptop out of Dean's reach.

"That was different!" Dean said emphatically. "We were seven years old, and curious. It's perfectly normal for kids to be curious about, you know. Stuff."

"And this one is you, Dean, snuggled up to Jimi, after a very long, very difficult and very high altitude birth," Sam continued relentlessly. "And this one is you, cuddled up to him in your bed."

"Now that one," Bobby said, gesturing at the photo of a rosy-cheeked, tousle-headed Dean asleep with Jimi sitting and watching him sleep with an adoring expression, "That one needs to go on a calendar somewhere, with a title like 'Man's Best Friend' or 'Loving Protector'."

"Well, you've had your fun," fumed Dean, "You can now delete those."

"Are you kidding?" Sam sounded incredulous. "These are pure gold! There's a parenting website that's running a contest to find the cutest kids in the US. I thought I'd enter you two. The one in the bath, with Jimi. You both have such adorable smiles."

"WHAT?" Dean was horrified. "You can't do that!"

"Already did," Sam announced smugly. "You really were a beautiful child, Dean, those freckles, those big green eyes. We could win money."

"Hear that, Dean? We're going to be rich and famous!" laughed Bobby. "Never thought anybody would want to look at pictures of me in the raw, although Ma had one of me on an honest-to-God bearskin rug that she used to get out for visitors..."

Dean just glared daggers at his brother. "Ohhhh, I am totally going to get you for that," he warned.

"Consider it payback for driving me crazy for the week," Sam told him. "You two were only adorable on the outside. You were totally little bastards."

"You probably deserved it," mumbled Dean, "Even when I was a kid, you were the Fun Police." He looked at his watch. "Now, I believe there was mention of pizza for dinner?"

"Nuh-uh," replied Sam, "That was only if you went upstairs when you were told, and you didn't. Naughty boys don't get pizza. Besides, I have a headache, and want to go to bed for a week. You should be getting me pizza."

Sam struck it lucky with some of his photos: 'Bath Time', the one of Bobby and Dean in the bath with Jimi, came runner-up in the cute kid contest, while 'Bouncing Baby Boy' of Dean and his 'baby' Jimi got an honourable mention. There was prize money. Sam used some of it to buy Dean some pornographic Victorian era postcards to use as smutty bookmarks. And a bottle of sorbolene lotion.

On another site, a dog food manufacturer chose 'Guardian Angel', the photo of Jimi watching Dean sleep, to promote their new premium kibble for large breeds. That was quite lucrative; there was a healthy cheque, and a large supply of premium dog food, by way of prizes.

Dean, however, was not impressed the first time he saw himself on packets of dog food.

He also spent a lot of time surreptitiously trying to guess Sam's laptop password, so he could go looking for the pictures and delete them, but he never managed it. He suspected that his brother would have them backed up on some obscure site somewhere, anyway. He tried to be philosophical about it, reasoning that nobody would ever recognise the Living Sex God as a seven-year-old.

However, the day he stumbled upon a photo of Braboy on a site listing 'Things To Do Inside On A Rainy Day', he went and cut the crotch out of every pair of Sam's shorts he could find.

**THE END**

* * *

><p>Hang on, does anybody else hear what sounds like a van pulling up outside Bobby's place?<p> 


	19. BONUS: Deleted Scene from Chapter 18

...For those who just couldn't wait for the DDD&SSS from 'Wolf In Wolf's Clothing' to make a reappearance. Because I know what my audience wants...

Le sigh. Denizens; they're depraved, even if they get shit done.

* * *

><p><strong>SPECIAL BONUS FEATURE: DELETED SCENE FROM CHAPTER 18<strong>

[scene opens at Bobby's front door]

*knock knock knock*

**Bobby:** ? ? ? *Answers door. Gaggle of ladeez sing their jingle.*

_Are your Winchesters a-bickering, does brother snipe at brother?  
><em>_Are they so tense and stressed they want to strangle one another?  
><em>_Call DDD&SSS to calm them down for you,  
><em>_We're local and we're mobile and we might do angels too._

**Bobby:** Oh, thank God you're here, those idjits need to calm the hell down.

**Bartlebead:** Leave it with us, sir, we are professionals, and I have a clipboard.

*They hustle inside in a very business-like manner*

_[upstairs]_

**Sam: **Honestly, I feel like I've been through the wringer. Those kids were hell to deal with; I was constantly on the alert, waiting to see what would go wrong next...

**Ciya:** *massaging scalp* We should do a hair treatment for you, stress can make your hair fall out, you know.

**Sam (panicked): **It can? Nooooo, not my hair!

**Katiki: **Now now, you just relax, and let us deal with it. *shakes bottle of edible massage oil enthusiastically*

**Leahelisabeth:** *massaging* Hmmm, you're carrying a lot of tension in your shoulders. You clearly need extensive custard dunking, I mean relaxation therapy, to help you be more lickable, er, I mean, relaxed...

**Sam: **Yeeeeep! Oooo-OOOOO-ooooh! How does massaging me there stop my hair falling out?

*maybe-moey puts head around the door, waggles chocolate-daubing brush*

**Maybe-moey:** You guys good for chocolate in here?

**Katiki: **Just a little bit, here give me the brush for a sec...

**Sam?** What? YEEEEEEEEP!

**Leahelisabeth:** Don't be such a baby, here, let me rub the tickles away for you...

_[downstairs]_

**Bartlebead: **Now, Dean, why don't you tell me what's wrong? *pats Dean's knee encouragingly*

**Dean:** It was terrible. He took pictures! Of me, the Living Sex God, having a bath with the dog! I feel humiliated, and dehumanised, and objectified.

**knivespast (nodding sypathetically):** Here, let me peel you another chocolate...

**Dean:** He took a picture of me wearing an industrial-strength bra! *bottom lip trembles*

**Aeicha:** You poor thing, come lay your aching head in my lap, stressed out darling...

**Dean:** It's rattled my faith in my own masculinity, being treated like a naughty little boy! He dunked me in the baaaaath! *single tear makes its way down his face*

**SparklyLala:** Tut tut, that will never do. We think you're terribly masculine.

**Bartlebead (nodding vigorously):** Yes, we do.

**Aeicha:** And we're going to prove it to you.

**maybe-moey:** Did somebody call for the chocolate brush?

**knivespast:** To the custard tub, ladies!

*they hustle Dean out to the van*

**SeaGlassGreen:** Behold, I am Holey Panties, the Keeper Of The Custard Tub. Who approaches?

**Aeicha: **Dean is terribly stressed out, and having a crisis of masculinity.

**Dean (tearfully):** I beg access to your therapeutic custard tub, oh mighty Underwear Avenger.

**SeaGlassGreen: **Very well, but you must be a good boy, and do whatever your therapists say.

_[back indoors]_

**Castiel:** This is most irregular.

**Paralesky:** Look, think of it as vehicle maintenance. Dean has to maintain and service the Impala, right? So, you have to look after your vessel.

**Castiel:** Very well. Must I remove all of my clothing?

**Paralesky: **Well, not _all _of it, no...

**PaulatheCat: **Purr purr, heh heh, purr purr...

**Castiel:** Why is that cat walking up and down on me?

**Paralesky: **It's part of your therapy.

**Castiel (cocks head cutely): **It is strangely relaxing. My vessel would like you to continue to do that.

**PaulatheCat: **No problem, purr purr, heh heh, purr purr.

**Paralesky (taking chocolate brush from maybe-moey):** Did you know that some cats actually like chocolate?

**Castiel:** Oooooo-OOOOO-oooooh, the roughness of feline tongues is indeed a marvellous aspect of my Father's work...

_[in the kitchen]_

**Bobby:** Holy shit and Satan's toilet tissue, is that Feathers in there, naked?

**Lampito:** Nah, look, he's left his socks on.

**Bobby: **Oh, well, so long as that chocolate doesn't leave any stains on the sofa. *pours tea* So, what do you do?

**Lampito:** I drive the van, and try to block the screams out, mostly. Oh, and those little bandanas they end up wearing afterwards? I make those, cut 'em out and hem them up.

**Bobby: **You know, I have a second edition of _De Revolutionibus_ in the study.

**Lampito:** I can appreciate a man who gives great mind.

[end scene]

[director faints. cameraman throws up. Jared and Jensen run for their trailers, wearing little bandanas and custard, and refuse to come out. Misha tweets furiously. Jim sighs longingly at custard tub. producer cuts that bit, footage is lost and never seen again on legal advice.]

**THE END. REALLY.**

* * *

><p>I will, of course, have to update if I am made aware of anybody doing anything fanart-ish (Denizens: depraved, but they Get Shit Done). Meanwhile, can you believe it? ANOTHER FRIGGING BUNNY! It's very young at this stage, not terribly articulate, but I've found that actually writing a bit sometimes encourages them to come up with more plot. This one's a bit disturbing though. I see... a Cupid, a heartbroken Cupid, sobbing desperately at having failed to complete a very important mission... I see Castiel, Sheriff of Heaven, trying to console the Cupid... I see Castiel, taking a cue from humans, and outsourcing, calling in an outside consultant... I see Castiel turning to the person he knows is an expert in the field of male-female relations... I see horrified refusals, and complaints about the uniform, or lack thereof... but that's all I got at the moment. We'll see.<p> 


	20. COMMUNITY SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: FANART!

**SPECIAL COMMUNITY SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT SPECIAL COMMUNITY SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT SPECIAL COMMUNITY SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT**

* * *

><p>OMGWTFBBQ!<p>

PaulatheCat had done some fanart for this story, and IT IS TEH AWESUM!

http**COLONSLASHSLASH** paulathecat**DOT** deviantart**DOT** com/#/d4d635m

Replace the bits in bold with the indicated symbols (don't forget to remove the spaces after them).

I love the peaceful expressions on the faces of Dean, Bobby and Jimi. They seem so comfortably nodded off, considering the stories that Cas was telling them at the time. You know, David getting stoned off his ass, Aaron's family being constipated, and Samson slaying 1000 men with the assbone of a Jew...

Don't forget to leave her a message telling her how clever she is!

Denizens: they're depraved, but they get shit done.


End file.
